Reviewer’s Assumptions about Audience
by Kathy G. Short, The University of Arizona
Having written book reviews for various publications, I am aware of the difficulty of succinctly conveying a summary of the text, description of the illustrations, discussion of themes, and evaluation of the book in a few sentences. Many book reviews are one short paragraph, providing little space to convey much of a sense of the book. My conversations with other educators over the past several months have led me to wonder about the unwritten rules for writing these reviews that have developed out of a need to be so brief. I wonder if we have fallen into some practices as reviewers that send unintended messages to the readers of those reviews.
Yoo Kyung Sung is writing her dissertation on a postcolonial analysis of picture books published in the U.S. that focus on Korean-American protagonists. Part of her analysis included reading and analyzing the reviews of these books. She found that none of them evaluated the cultural authenticity of the books or raised questions about authenticity or accuracy, even though there were some serious problems in most of the books. Reviewers seemed to accept that the books were authentic, particularly if written by a Korean American; a stance that is understandable since none of the reviewers were cultural insiders.
What I find particularly interesting is that Yoo Kyung found that the reviewers assumed a particular audience and intention. They assumed a non-Korean-American audience as readers of the book and so focused on the ways in which the book could build multicultural awareness for a broad mainstream audience. They particularly highlighted themes that are shared across cultures, such as adjusting to a new school or dealing with a bully. On one hand, this decision makes sense because this type of review would persuade a larger group of librarians or teachers to purchase the book. Also, Yoo Kyung points out that these reviews could reflect the audience that the authors of the books had in mind—that even when the authors are insiders, they are writing for a broad mainstream audience rather than to Korean-American children. Clearly, there are major market implications and publishers would want to reach this broader market.
On the other hand, this constant focus on speaking to a mainstream audience is a matter of concern. Rudine Sims Bishop argues that authors of color who write for children within their own culture often write to enhance children’s self-concept, challenge existing stereotypes, and pass on the central values and stories of their culture to their children. Authors writing outside their culture for a broader audience often intend to build awareness of cultural differences and improve intercultural relationships. Both intentions are significant, but they result in different stories for different audiences. By always focusing on multicultural awareness within reviews, the needs of children from within a culture and these differing intentions are overlooked. Reviews that only focus on cross-cultural connections may also unintentionally devalue the needs of readers within a culture.
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- Themes: Kathy G. Short
- Descriptors: Debates & Trends
Thought you may be interested in this relevant message from PaperTigers:
This year PaperTigers.org will be recognizing, for the first time, a special set of books that embody our mission to promote cross-cultural understanding, and it would be great if you could help us by suggesting 3 to 6 of your favorites to be considered for the set that will receive the “Spirit of Paper Tigers” seal.
This seal will signal the quality of the books – books that “stand out”. What is really special, however, is that these outstanding books will then be distributed to those who otherwise would not have access to them.
Our aim is straightforward: we aim to select a set of 6 books – 3 of them from the younger picture book range and 3 from the middle-reader range – that we will send to schools, local libraries etc in areas of need in different parts of the world. We will also talk about these six books in our December issue of PaperTigers and on our blog.
Here are our criteria:
- Books that reflect the multicultural or cross-cultural focus of PaperTigers, i.e. books that promote knowledge of “the other”, books that encourage empathy and understanding
- Books that kids enjoy reading!
- Books in English, or bilingual with English as one of the languages
- Books in the picture book and middle-reader range, roughly 4 to12 years
- Books that, in this first year and for practical reasons, were published in the United States and/or Canada between the beginning of June, 2008, and the end of June, 2009.
At this stage our Spirit of PaperTigers Book Set project is a modest one, but we are excited about it. We hope to build it up into something bigger in the future. We also hope that, in the schools or libraries that receive the sets of books, arrangements will be put in place for the children themselves to choose – from within the set – their favorite picture book or their favorite middle-reader book. We would then present the choices made by the young readers on our site and blog.
Your suggestions, along with those of others who have strong interest in books for young readers, will help us have a better picture of what is out there. So, over to you, now: if you could possibly send me your favorites by July 1, that would be a great help.