Over recent years there has been a growing call for more diversity in our children's literature, and rightly so. Our literature should reflect the people who make up our society with more representation of different cultures, ethnicities, abilities/disabilities, sexual orientation and gender. I have wrestled with what I can and can't write about myself, growing in my understanding of what my limits are and ceding space (if it is in my power to do so) to those who will do a far better job than me.
Back in 2016 a picture book of mine was called out for having a male main character in an article discussing a lack of female representation. I confess the rebuke stung but it did its job because I became much more aware of who I was writing into my stories. But I have discovered over the years that there is a flaw in my gender representation plan. Readers/reviewers/folk-in-general DO NOT NOTICE. They decide and then that is the gender of the character. They ignore my clues ('he said', or 'she said' or a complete lack of identifying pronouns).
Where I have avoided pronouns to enable the reader to make their own decisions I guess it might be fair enough that the reviewer/discusser has decided for themselves to apply a label, although ideally they would also take the route of making it vague - it's for the target audience to decide, not the reviewer or other adult intermediary.
My dilemma I guess is that I am wondering if my efforts are having the desired effect; am I managing to reach the people for whom this really matters (the kids are alright and we just need the grown-ups to catch up)? I suppose my books aren't centering the gender discussion so this might contribute to the assumptions being made, but I make deliberate decisions about my characters when I am crafting my stories and I am perplexed when these get no cut through. Sometimes my decisions are about ensuring there is an even mix of genders in the story, sometimes it is about challenging our expectations of roles and who performs/inhabits them, and sometimes it is just a practical decision - in BatKiwi for example male kiwis are smaller and female bats are bigger so the female bat has more chance of carrying the male kiwi (although actual physics/reality makes it impossible sadly), however I also didn't want a male bat swooping in to save the day for the female kiwi.
When I review or talk about books other than my own I try to do my due diligence (although I am likely to have got it wrong sometimes in the past too). Novels are easier in some respects because character names and context can be obvious signifiers (although not always), but in a picture book it is a simple task to check. This isn't all about me and maybe these reactions don't matter but gender representation is important and I am just wondering - are the choices I'm making working like I hope they will? Are these responses just an anomaly or are they something to be addressed?
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