ICI London is thrilled to participate in EUROLIS Seminar 2024, Gender Roles and Stereotypes in Children’s Literature: What Can Librarians Do?
Children’s books have a significant place in children’s development, as they contribute to shape their identity, aspirations, and expectations of gender roles in families, and society. However, the majority of the books represent a world full of traditional, binary, and stereotypical gender roles (boys described as active and domineering, girls described as sweet and conforming, etc.).
What can librarians do to challenge male and female stereotypes, promote positive role models, and celebrate gender equality?
Italy’s Speaker is Marnie Campagnaro, Associate Professor of Children’s Literature at the University of Padua. Marnie’s presentation will be Gender Representation in Italian Children’s Literature: From the Postwar Period to the Present. The representation of gender in Italian children’s literature has evolved significantly through the last decades. From the 1960s and 1970s, with series such as “Tantibambini” (1972-1978) and “Dalla parte delle bambine” (1975), to the new millennium with publishers such as Settenove (2013) and Lo Stampatello (2011), and contemporary series like “Sottosopra” by EDT Giralangolo, Italian picture books have challenged traditional stereotypes. Authors such as Giusi Quarenghi, Beatrice Masini, Octavia Monaco, Chiara Carrer and Beatrice Alemagna have reimagined roles and depictions, enriching young readers’ imaginations and fostering a multi-faceted view of reality, even in works that are not expressly gender-oriented. Marnie will share the results of her research as a tool for librarians to recognise gender bias, acknowledge how it evolves through the decades and hone their selection of readings for young readers.
This year’s Seminar is an in-person event at Europe House in London (32 Smith Square, London, SW1P 3EU) on Friday 22nd of November 2024, from 10.00 am to 4.30 pm. This event will be conducted in English.
More info about the Seminar HERE
Free attendance and booking is required. To reserve your spot, click HERE
This project is co-organised by the European Parliament Liaison Office in the United Kingdom and EUROLIS, an association of librarians and information professionals from Austria, Italy, France, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and the UK from the European Cultural Institutes based in London and CILIP. Founded in 2002, Eurolis believes that libraries and information services are vital for building an educated and open society, based on the idea of a free Europe that flourishes through its diversity and tolerance of other cultures. This collaborative project is created by trust and cooperation between its members, emphasising that the whole is greater than the sum of its individual parts.
Marnie Campagnaro is an Associate Professor of Children’s Literature at the University of Padua’s FISPPA Department. She directs the postgraduate Children’s Literature programme and leads the LETIN Unipd research group. Her main research fields include picture books, materiality, reader-response theory, design, architecture, visual and arts-based historical and educational studies, object-oriented criticism, fairy tales and Italian children’s writers. Actively engaged in various research initiatives, she collaborates with educational institutions, libraries and publishers. As Task Leader in the “Green Dialogues” NOTED-European Project (2022-2025), she advocates for climate literacy and walking as a critical inquiry. Marnie has published more than 90 papers in various high-quality peer-reviewed journals.