BENNY DOESN'T LIKE TO BE HUGGED by Zetta Elliott; illustrated by Purple Wong

Update from Debbie on Feb 18, 2020:

On Feb 13, 2020, Ashleigh (she’s 13) from OfGlades (the OfGlades group publishes Indigo's Bookshelf), wrote a series of tweets about my recommendation of Benny Doesn't Like to Be Hugged. With their permission, I am sharing the tweets, here:

Ms. Debbie has taught us a lot & shared sensitive information, so I was very sad to see that she chose Benny Doesn’t Like to be Hugged by Zetta Elliott as one of her fav bks. My little sister Vi is autistic. It’s good Ms. Debbie writes ‘autistic’ instead of ‘child with autism,’ but that’s where the good stops. This bk is full of painful stereotypes. Vi likes hugs as much as me! I can be fussy too.  Don’t understand what Ms. Debbie means by “unique traits.” Vi doesn’t exist to teach everyone to “accept our differences.” (This is more than 2 tweets, but I have a lot of feels). We all saw the numbers about disabled ppl in bks. This 1 doesn’t help, tho we love other books by Ms. Zetta. Follow @BeingKaylaSmith 2 learn more. TY.

It is crucial that I listen to readers, especially when the reader is sharing personal experiences with a book.  

An #ActuallyAutistic person responded to OfGlades, saying that as a child, they hated being hugged, and found Benny Doesn’t Like to be Hugged affirming. OfGlades replied by sharing book covers for A Friend for Henry (written by Jenn Bailey; illustrated by Mika Song), and I See Things Differently: A First Look at Autism (by Pat Thomas), saying:

We’re glad it resonated with you. Unfortunately, stereotypical behavior is pretty much the only subject of picture bks about autistic kids. The one on the left is an award winner from this year—the other has almost the same exact cover image. Today’s kids want & deserve more.

Clearly, the OfGlades group is seeing a pattern in how children’s books are depicting autism.  I have work to do on intersectionality. I’ve learned from OfGlades and am grateful to them for the work they do. 

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BENNY DOESN'T LIKE TO BE HUGGED (original post on October 3, 2017)

A few days ago, I added a new feature to AICL. I called it "Reviewed on Twitter." It is for books that I talk about on Twitter, in a series of numbered or threaded tweets. Earlier today (October 3, 2017), I did one for Zetta Elliott's Benny Doesn't Like to Be Hugged. Here's the description for Zetta's book:

A little girl uses rhyming verse to describe the unique traits of her autistic friend. Benny likes trains and cupcakes without sprinkles, but he can also be fussy sometimes. The narrator doesn’t mind, however, because “true friends accept each other just the way they are.” A gentle story encouraging children to appreciate and accept our differences.

I like the immediacy of Twitter, capturing and sharing joy (or frustration) when I get a book and want to say something about it, right away. If you want to follow me on Twitter, I'm @debreese. So here you go... tweets I sent out about Zetta's book! 

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In my mailbox today! @zettaelliott's BENNY DOESN'T LIKE TO BE HUGGED.

Zetta and I have lot of terrific conversations about children's lit, and some about institutional racism, too. I admire her a great deal.

One time when we were talking -- online, I think -- I said that any of the kids in her picture books might be a Native child.

I wasn't talking about that "culturally neutral" thing some people like. That is a bogus concept that I reject.

What I meant was that a Native person's identity is not determined by dark hair/eyes/skin, or, ummm... cheekbones!

Native identity is based on citizenship, or kinship relationships, in a specific tribal nation.

We talked, then, about how a writer might signify or hint at a character's Native identity, in a picture book that isn't abt Native ppl.

And how to do it, without resorting to stereotypical markers (long braids, fringed clothing, moccasins)...

Where I ended was 'how about a t-shirt' that a Native kid might wear, one that shows that kid's pride in something Native.

Zetta follows my work and knows I'm a huge fan of @arigonstarr's SUPER INDIAN.

A few weeks ago, she wrote to me to ask about having Super Indian on the t-shirt. I was PSYCHED at that idea. I introduced her to Arigon.

In my head, I was remembering working with Pueblo kids at Santa Clara. I showed them SUPER INDIAN. They love that bk.

And, I had a Super Indian tote bag that @misskubelik gave me. It, too, was much-loved by them.

So! In BENNY DOESN'T LIKE TO BE HUGGED, there's a Native kid in one scene, wearing a Super Indian t-shirt as he plays basketball:

Zetta's in NYC. There's a lot of Native people in NYC. That character might seem a small thing to some, but I think that...

... any Native kid who happens to read this book and knows Super Indian... is gonna go WHOA!!!

They're gonna say "LOOK!!! It is Super Indian!" Thanks, Zetta. I think this is way cool.

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As I sent out that series of tweets, two Native women--Chelsea Vowell and Adrienne Keene--who I admire tremendously for their work, too, were reading the tweets and then enthusiastically shared them with their followers. Repeating what I said on Twitter: this might look small to some people, but to me and the Native people who are sharing it on Twitter... it means a lot.

Get a copy of Benny Doesn't Like to Be Hugged, and get Arigon Starr's Super Indian books, too!

Some thoughts on the "Diverse BookFinder" Project

I started getting email from people who wondered if I had seen the Diverse BookFinder website. And, I began to see people sharing it on social media, with comments that suggest it is a good place to find books about diverse groups of people:

"A resource for finding diverse books"
"Great resource!"
"Helps users find diverse picture books"
"Awesome book finder!"
"Wonderful site! I need to get my hands on these books!"
"Makes it easier to find diverse books..."

Lot of enthusiasm! So, I went to take a look and tweeted my observations as I looked through it. With this post I want to say a bit more than I said on Twitter.

First, some background: the country is in another of its many periods where people are working hard to promote books that accurately represent marginalized peoples. At some point, it will not be another period of this kind of work. It won't be necessary. Data shows, however, that we've got a long way to go to get to where the body of literature published/republished each year is not that "all white world" that Nancy Larrick pointed to in 1965.

The Diverse BookFinder project is one of many in the works right now. We Need Diverse Books launched its Our Story app a few weeks ago. I recommend it. I spent time going through it.

Even more recently, Kirkus partnered with Baker & Taylor to help librarians find books. I have not had a chance to look through that one.

And--I'm part of the See What We See project, and I'll also be working with the newly funded Diversity Deep Dive Project at the University of Wisconsin-Madison's Cooperative Children's Book Center. 

That's the background. And now, some thoughts on Diverse BookFinder.

Their mission/vision statement says that they want to "diversify and balance bookshelves everywhere" and that they want to "move the diverse books discussion beyond a focus simply on the lack of numbers to also consider content and impact." They write that "improving cultural accuracy" is essential. I agree with all of that. But when I move beyond that page to other pages, I find problems. 

We can start with the Search page. I put "Native" in the search box. Returns are presented, ten per screen. As I paged through, I saw that a lot of the books have the "folklore" category. That's a problem. Some of those stories are creation stories. They aren't folktales and they ought not be considered within the same framework as Beauty and the Beast. Here's a screen cap of the Categories page at the Diverse BookFinder site. 

The first category is also a problem. It is "Any Child: Assimilation."

The "just kids" or "any child" idea -- I see that it has appeal but I also see it as deeply problematic. It erases so much of what Native and children of color carry within them, in an unseen way to most, that informs or shapes what they say and do, think and feel. It assumes that beneath the physical features of any given person, they are "the same" underneath. Linda Sue Park's blog post about "race neutral" is terrific. I urge you to read it. She said, in part:

If a story depicts someone who leaves their own home and interacts with others in public spaces (in other words, almost any novel ever written) but never or almost never has to consider their racial identity, THAT CHARACTER IS WHITE. This could even serve as a reasonable definition of ‘white privilege’: Only those of the dominant culture have that incredible luxury.

A POC can never go outside their own home or family circle without thinking about their racial identity in some way. The trigger is not always malicious or even negative, but it is inescapable. A POC’s racial identity IS NOT THEIR SOLE DEFINING CHARACTERISTIC–but in society, it is *always* a consideration.

I shared it, and KT Horning's "Culturally Generic/Neutral?", too, with Anne. She knew of KT's and said it really influenced their thinking, but I'm having a hard time understanding what that means. I'm not able to connect the dots.

Assimilation -- the word and what it represents -- is not positive. If you say that word to a Native person, they are likely recalling the many times the US government tried to make us into White people. That happened, overtly, in the boarding schools where the motto was to "kill the Indian" and to "save the man." There were other programs, too. Do the developers of the Diverse BookFinder need to keep that in mind as they create and use categories? I think so.

In the list of categories on the left margin (it is different from the Category Chart that has "Any Child: Assimilation" -- which also confuses me), is "Tribal-Nation." I was glad to see that, because I figured that's where I'd find books about Native peoples as peoples of sovereign nations. But when I clicked on it, I was puzzled. It isn't specific to Native peoples of the US. Most of the tabs under it are Native Nations of the US but some are not. Two that are not are Bhil, and Massai. My expectation was wrong. I was confused at first and still wonder if "Tribal-Nation" is going to work for users or not.

I saw two Pueblo nations in the list, but Elan, Son of Two Peoples is not about anyone from the Pueblo of Sandia.  Elan is from Acoma. It says so, in the book. And Whispers of the Wolf is under the tab for Pueblo of Santa Clara, but it isn't set there. That one doesn't have a setting other than an ambiguous before contact with Europeans. A note inside from someone who is from Santa Clara doesn't mean the story should be labeled as a Santa Clara story. It isn't by a Native writer. So--the team that categorized these two books made errors.

Creating a database that will be helpful to users means starting with words that will grab the books that should be scooped up in a particular search or category. In the Cherokee category, I see a book about a Chinese American film star and a book that is First Nations (Canada). The We Need Diverse Books app had some of those problems, too, but they asked me to look it over before they released it.

Bottom line: I'm confused over what the project means to do. It seems to me that it is supposed to be a study. A research study. Of a collection in a college library that will be adding books to it. But the Finder part... just confuses me. I'm trying to make sense of it. For now, I can't recommend it. I'll check in on it from time to time.


After my initial tweets, Anne Sibley O'Brien, one of its founders, replied:

"This is really helpful, Debbie, suggests that we need a very clear statement on the site that inclusion in the site =/= recommendation."

They added this statement to the top of the Search page:

Our intention is to acquire and make available ALL picture books featuring indigenous people and people of color published in the U.S. since 2002, including reprints. Inclusion of a title in the collection DOES NOT EQUAL recommendation. See our related readings page for suggested links for evaluating books.

I'm not sure that statement helps. It seems to say "here's a way to find all the books" and "it is on you" to figure out if they're any good. For most people, some things will be obvious. If, for example, Little Black Sambo was reprinted, they would include it in their database. Most people, I think, would know that book is racist and wouldn't get it to use with children. They might use it in with adults in college classes, but not with children. 

The Cover for Eric Gansworth's GIVE ME SOME TRUTH

If you're a regular reader of AICL, you know I think Eric Gansworth's If I Ever Get Out of Here is outstanding. I recommend it all the time when I work with teachers and librarians.

Today, Nerdy Book Club was the host for the cover reveal for his next book, Give Me Some Truth, which will be out in 2018.

Here's some of what he said:

[W]hen I’m getting ready to write a new novel, I look at my existing cast of characters, and develop a new one by first identifying which other characters they’re related to. I ask the new character, “Now whose kid are you?”

As a Native person, I smiled as I read "whose kid are you" and I wondered who would be at the center of Give Me Some Truth! Who, I wondered, would take me back into a Native community that feels very real to me.

Gansworth doesn't have to sit there at his computer and think "how would a Native kid" think or feel or speak. He's writing from a lived experience. His writing resonates with me and so many Native people who have read and shared If I Ever Get Out of Here.

Head over to Nerdy Book Club and see what else Gansworth said, and keep an eye out for Give Me Some Truth. 

_______________________

Back to add Gansworth's bio:

Eric Gansworth (Sˑha-weñ na-saeˀ) is Lowery Writer-in-Residence and Professor of English at Canisius College in Buffalo, NY and was recently NEH Distinguished Visiting Professor at Colgate University. An enrolled member of the Onondaga Nation, Eric grew up on the Tuscarora Indian Nation, just outside Niagara Falls, NY. His debut novel for young readers, If I Ever Get Out of Here, was a YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults pick and an American Indian Library Association Young Adult Honor selection, and he is the author of numerous acclaimed books for adults. Eric is also a visual artist, generally incorporating paintings as integral elements into his written work. His work has been widely shown and anthologized and has appeared in IROQUOIS ART: POWER AND HISTORY, THE KENYON REVIEW, and SHENANDOAH, among other places, and he was recently selected for inclusion in LIT CITY, a Just Buffalo Literary Center public arts project celebrating Buffalo’s literary legacy. Please visit his website at www.ericgansworth.com.    

Twitter Conversations about Scholastic's THE ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED POLICE

On September 22, 2017, a parent in Canada tagged me on a tweet about a book in his child's kindergarten classroom. He asked "What are kids learning about Canadian history? He shared four images from inside a book:

The pages are from The Royal Canadian Mounted Police by Marc Tetro, first published in 1994 by Scholastic Canada, for kids 5-8 years old. The tweet generated a fair bit of interest.

When I retweeted it, I tagged Scholastic:

Earlier today (Sep 25), Scholastic Canada replied:

I don't think there are any mechanisms by which a teacher or librarian would know that Scholastic stopped publishing this book because of the issues with its content. Clearly, it is still in at least one classroom in Canada.

I looked in WorldCat to see how many libraries have it. Given the issues in it, it shouldn't be in a public or school library. It does have use, however, in a university library. Unfortunately, it is in several public and school district libraries. If you've got it in your library, deselect it.

Not Recommended: SUSANNA MOODIE: ROUGHING IT IN THE BUSH, A GRAPHIC NOVEL by Carol Shields and Patrick Crowe

Today, AICL is launching a new feature. I'm calling it Reviewed On Twitter and it will have its own label. Sometimes, I tweet that I got a book. If I have something more to say as I look it over, I send a second tweet, and a third, and so on. I end up with something akin to a review, except that it is in a series of tweets. Too often, I never get a review written and posted. That means that anyone who reads AICL but doesn't follow me on Twitter, doesn't see what I said about the book. I don't know if this new feature is going to work out or not, but, we'll see.

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Not Recommended

On September 17, 2017, CBC News ran a news item by Angela Sterritt. In 'A punch in the gut': Mother slams B.C. high school exercise connecting Indigenous women to 'squaw', Steritt wrote about a worksheet from a guide for a graphic novel being taught in her daughter's classroom. The graphic novel is Susanna Moodie: Roughing it in the Bush. Below are my tweets, as I read through it. I started on September 21. Published by Second Story Press in 2016, it is not recommended. 

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In today's mail; not looking forward to rdg ROUGHING IT IN THE BUSH.

Page 2. Nothing in the text says anything about Thanksgiving. Why is it there?

Doesn't that look like an American Thanksgiving scene? Set in 1810, this is supposedly a story about going to Canada.

In Ch 1, Susanna meets her man, gets married; in ch 2 they set off for Canada. On Aug 30, 1832, they approach "The New World."

In ch 3, her husband, John, is out hunting. He comes home, sees Indians, aims his rifle at them; Susanna says she's ok.

The Indians (Chief Peter Nogan, his wife, their son) are teachng her their language. They name her, Nonocosoqui. It means Little Bird.

Susanna can draw. She draws a bird. The chief's wife says "your squaw is a much clever woman."

Susanna draws more, there's talk of trading. She gives them pieces of her fancy mirror (it mostly shattered on its way to their cabin).

I gotta say: stories that have Indians staring into mirrors, marveling, enable a "primitive" image. Water surfaces reflect image, too!

Oh... they give her a gift... she looks in a mirror shard.... it is a bone choker (some of my Native friends will get a kick out of that).

A few days later a Black man gives her a cow. He tells her he heard she's a writer. He tells her "this is no country for writing." Damn.

That "no country for writing" is another problem. It suggests Native ppls were primitive and didn't write.

The Black man's name is Mollineux. He knows abt writing (Shakespeare, specifically) because his master on VA plantation let him use library.

I should note that Susanna and John are Elitist Good White People. They don't like lower class men, like the ones in ch 4...

Ch 4 is about a "logging bee." Lot of working men come to work for Susanna and John. The morning they are due to arrive, Susanna's...

... maid ran away. Susanna doesn't know how to cook, but have no choice. The workers give her a hard time.

An American neighbor goes over to Susanna's. But, they're squatters! LOL. Susanna dissing on Americans. She even says that they...

... ""borrow" the land on which are farm now stood!" I guess Susanna and John got their land... legally?! Again:

The American squatter woman gives Susanna heck abt not sitting down with the workers. "You invite the Indians" but not "your helps."

Susanna wants to avoid "Speechifying on Yankee democracy" so changes subject to Mollineux. Squatter woman says he used to work for her...

... and he had "good conduct" but she "could never abide him for being black." Susanna says Mollineux is "same flesh and blood" as...

... squatter woman's "helps" and asks if he sat at their table. "Mercy me, my helps would leave if I put such an affront to them."

I should have noted when I started this thread, that the teacher's guide for ROUGHING IT IN THE BUSH is why I ordered this book.

I did a long thread on the guide a couple of days ago.

1. I ordered a copy of ROUGHING IT IN THE BUSH (graphic novel adaptation of the 1852 book) in this news item:

2. Question for @_secondstory -- why did you publish ROUGHING IT IN THE BUSH as a graphic novel? I'm flipping thru 1852 bk and.. 

3. I see "squaw" a lot. Here's one passage: "a very large, fat, ugly squaw" is the first example.

4. In the original, "squaw" appears 39 times. How many times is it in the graphic novel? Course, even once is not ok.

5. Hmmmm... I searched the original for the word "darkie" that is definitely in the graphic novel, but it isn't in the original.

6. The original has the n word but the author pushes back on racist ideas. See?

7. Is that passage in the graphic novel... with "darkie" used instead?

8. Teacher's guide for bk is here: [It was removed for review.] See disclaimer? Why say "not politically correct" instead of racist? 

9. And, the person who wrote "of that time" is clearly living under a rock. Those prejudices and racist language are still here, TODAY. 

10. This guide is clearly written with White students/teachers in mind.

11. Did its author and publisher not realize Native and Black kids are part of today's society? First suggested activity is to imagine... 

12. ... life as a "pioneer." It is f'ed up to ask a Native child to imagine what it was like to be a "pioneer." 

13. The guide asks students for good definition of pioneer. How about "a biased word for someone who invaded Native lands." 

14. Here's another question from the guide. I don't see a question asking students how an Indigenous person felt...

15. The next question asks if relationships between pioneers and indigenous ppl improved. Guessing the answer is supposed to be yes.

16. Next activity: build a model of a pioneer village. That kind of thing centers Whiteness. Teachers: don't do this!

17. The third activity is about "politically incorrect" language:

18. Lot going wrong in this activity. In this true/false statement about words that "everyone" used? "Everyone" means White people. 

19. And here's the activity that brought attention to this messed up book and teacher's guide for it. Guide tries to say "don't use... 

20... certain words today" but then uses them in the activity like they're facts kids must learn. 

Where was I? Oh, yeah, the squatter woman and the not squatter woman trying to out-do each other with their imagined superiority.

Well, damn. When I was looking at the guide the other day, I saw that ch 6 is about a "shivaree" but didn't know what that was. I do now.

By ch 6, Mollineux has married an Irish girl. It is nighttime, men have fiddles, drums, masks. They go to his house: "Come on Darkie!"

One calls "string him up". They pour tar on him, feathers... When I first heard of this book, I asked WHY it was published.

It seems to me that the publisher and writers of the graphic novel & guide had NO IDEA that Native or Black kids would be asked to read it.

The graphic novel, published in 2016, has an Intro by Margaret Atwood. Her recent Emmy probably makes the bk more saleable. But...

But I can't see her name anymore and not remember her involvement in the Joseph Boyden messes.

I'll stop for now with this quick look at ROUGHING IT IN THE BUSH. If it was assigned to my child, I'd raise hell for sure.

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When I quit last night, I had finished Ch 6, "Shivaree." I didn't share any pain-inducing images from those pages. I'm still aghast at them.

The bk is marked as being for kids in sixth grade and on up. Those "Shivaree" pages are brutal.

Ch 7 is called "John Managhan." John goes to Susanna's house, asking for work. He's hurt but Susanna's new servant won't help him.

He starts to work for Susanna. Kind of heroic. Even tells Susanna's husband how to deliver their 2nd baby when the midwife can't get there.

That's because he's a Roman Catholic. An inset box tells us that enmities between religions ran high "in those days." Not today, I guess?!

Life is getting harder for Susanna. Milk, bread, and potatoes are sometimes all they have to eat. But wait!

Remember the Indian Chief from the start of the book? He comes by from time to time and gives them fish.

Susanna gives most of the food to her family. Husband notices, tells her she has to eat more because he needs her help in the fields.

Susanna cries. She is "reduced to field-labour" but understands why. She steps up but they don't have skills, really, to do this work.

Life gets harder and harder. There's a page where she's grimacing as she skins squirrels for their meals. She's also upset because...

... her sister, who had visited (briefly) in ch 5, has written a book that has "made this wretched wilderness into a fool's paradise."

Susanna's husband tells her to write, again, as she had before they left England. Write the truth of their lives, he says.

Susanna doesn't want to do that. Everyone in England would think of her, living in a log hut, consorting with vulgar ppl & Americans.

But, after a while, she does (write). War breaks out. John has to leave. Oh... here's Indians again as Indian women show her how to fish.

I've looked thru and thru the book. No mention of what tribal nation Susanna was learning words from, or learning fishing techniques...

The thread this tweet is part of is about the graphic novel, SUSANNA MOODIE: ROUGHING IT IN THE BUSH that was (is?) being taught in Canada.

It is based on a book with that same title, written by Moodie, published in 1852. In the original, Moodie used "Indian" 118 times.

You can see the original, here: I don't plan to do any analysis of the 1852 one compared to the 2015 one.

Mostly, I just wonder why Second Story thought it was a good idea to make this graphic novel adaptation, for young ppl of today.

I don't recall seeing a disclaimer like this one, inside ROUGHING IT IN THE BUSH. See that past tense, "were", in there? (Because text in photo is small, I am inserting it here: "Common prejudices in the nineteenth century resulting from antagonisms between Protestants and Catholics, or racism perpetuated by white Europeans against Blacks and Aboriginals, were reflected in the everyday language people used to describe themselves and each other. Today it is unacceptable to use words such as Indian, squaw, darkie, Negro,Yankee, or Papist.")

There's something like that disclaimer in the teaching guide for the bk, too. That guide got pulled. Will the book get pulled, too?

My guess is, no. It was (is?) being used in classrooms in Canada, which means it was bought in quantities. Just for one class? More?