Critical Approaches to Children's Literature
Full time Master of Philosophy (MPhil)
Part time Master of Education (MEd)
"Good children's literature appeals not only to the child in the adult, but to the adult in the child."
Anonymous
"You have to write the book that wants to be written. And if the book will be too difficult for grown-ups, then you write it for children."
Madeleine L'Engle
"You cannot write for children. They're much too complicated. You can only write books that are of interest to them."
Maurice Sendak
Introduction
This specialist Masters router is aimed at applicants who already have knowledge of and interest in children's literature and who want to develop expertise in the subject at masters' level. In this route students will meet old favourites and make new exciting acquaintances. They will be introduced the most recent debates on the nature and social function of this controversial and multifaceted kind of literature. They will also be provided with the tools for a critical assessment of books written and marketed for the young audience.
What makes this route distinctive?
This thematic Masters route is distinctive from children's literature Masters at other universities in the following respects:
- A whole term element (8 x 2 hours) on students writing their own fiction and poetry for children (including a visit from a well known writer);
- A whole term element (8 x 2 hours) on visual texts for children;
- A strong emphasis on poetry for children and media texts;
- A core research training element which runs alongside this thematic route.
Route content
As well as considering picturebooks, poetry, media texts and writing for children, this thematic route concentrates on a wide range of fiction for children, including the 'classics', texts for very young readers, international literature and novels for young adults. Close textual study and the history of children's literature are embedded within the route which also concerns itself with exciting new texts (often using sound and image) produced by ever changing new technologies. Qualitative action research involving empirical work with children on visual literacy will be undertaken during the route. Participants are encouraged to keep a working journal and to include references to their own reading autobiographies.
Theoretical perspectives
The route focuses throughout on different representations of childhood in the texts that are studied and examines what is meant by the contested term 'children's literature'. Participants will be expected to engage with some of the key debates in the field and to consider a range of theoretical perspectives - from Romanticism to reader-response theory; gender issues to postmodernism; historical studies to New Historicism; sociocultural viewpoints to semiotics - as well as examining critically views of young readers and their reading choices.
Teaching Team
In this route you will meet an exceptional team of specialists in children's literature, including Gabrielle Cliff Hodges, Louise Joy, Maria Nikolajeva, Morag Styles and David Whitley.
Assignments
The assignments reflect the nature of this route which is designed to be personally rewarding as well as professionally enlightening and intellectually challenging.
Essay 1
A theorised autobiography of myself as a reader of texts for children with particular reference to changing constructions of childhood.
Essay 2
An empirical study of children responding to a selected picturebook.
Thesis
A topic of the applicant's own choosing which can either be a purely literary study or a small research project.
Route convenor:
MPhil Programme: Morag Styles - Reader in Children's Literature and Education
MEd Programme: Maria Nikolajeva - Professor of Education
Former students say:
"Forum for stimulating debate – a new way of thinking and a great group of peers to share feedback with"
"valuable and rewarding"
"Excellent opportunity to cover some authors/texts in-depth"
"The teachers are amazing and encouraging"
"Really wonderful learning environment"
"thought provoking"
Element descriptions:
Writing for children
Participants will be invited to try out writing for children in a number of genres, but to focus on one of [i] a sequence of poems OR [ii] a short story OR [iii] a fairy tale OR iv] a memoir and bring it to completion.
Key areas of focus are likely to include:
- writers on writing & reading; opening moves
- poetry writing workshop
- introduction to elements of fictional writing such as characterisation, plot, setting, dialogue…
- writing short stories
- writing contemporary fairy tales
- sharing and celebrating finished work
Visual Texts for Children
This very popular element concludes with an empirical study of children making meaning of multimodal texts. The element prepares participants for this research by examining the range and scope of pictorial texts – from picturebooks to graphic novels – and studying the relationship between image, printed word and layout. The element trains students to become analytical interpreters of visual texts for children and helps them understand some of the possibilities of visual literacy.
Key areas of focus are likely to include:
- introduction to the role and variety of international picturebooks
- analysing postmodern picturebooks
- children reading pictures
- the history of illustrated texts for children
- understanding multimodality and semiotic theory
- a collaborative project with artists on the MA in children's illustration at Anglia Ruskin University including a seminar series on Words about Pictures.
Images of Childhood in Film and Poetry
The way childhood is both imagined and understood depends heavily on images relating to child experience that are conjured in the mind's eye. This unit examines a range of significant issues associated with the way images of childhood are constructed. We will be looking at the changing nature and function of such images – and imagery – within two apparently quite different art forms, poetry and film. Although poetry and film have many obvious differences, both exhibit a potential for creating images that linger in the reader's – or audiences' – mind and may affect the way childhood is conceived at a deep level. In focusing on these two forms, we will pay particular attention to the relationship between 'image' (the visual embodiment of experience, caught at a particular moment) and 'imagery' (modes – such as metaphor, hyperbole, cross-cutting, close-up etc. - whereby images may be intensified, manipulated and interconnected to produce larger meanings). The element will examine the work of a range of poets and filmmakers, with a particular emphasis on how images of childhood develop within changing historical and cultural contexts.
Key areas of focus are likely to include:
- adaptations – how literary narratives are transformed into film versions
- from drawing board to moving image – the way childhood is represented within animated films
- images of authority, play and subversion in both film and poetry
- from the garden to the street – changing contexts within which the imagery of childhood is grounded in poetry
Culture and Texts: Fiction for Children
One key element of this element is introducing participants to a wide range of international fiction for children from 18thC to the present day with an emphasis on the latter. While these texts will be studied closely for their literary merit, they will also be examined in terms of ideological considerations such as race, class, gender. Another focus will be participants' own reading journeys with particular reference to memories of childhood (and young adulthood) reading and reflections on revisiting favourite texts and discovering new ones. This will lead naturally into the first assignment which takes the form of a theorised reading autobiography.
Key areas of focus are likely to include:
- historical perspectives on fiction written for children
- debates about what is children's literature
- international classic fiction
- some key genres such as adventure stories for boys
- fairy tales and fantasy
- contemporary fiction for young adult readers