¡Mira, Look!: Colección Antiprincesas

Saludos todos! I’m back with my weekly Mira, Look posts after a short time off for Spring Break. This month we have been celebrating Women’s History Month by featuring books about the wonderful women found throughout history and within our personal lives as well. This week I’ll be reviewing three books from the Colección Antiprincesas. This collection is meant to feature “grandes mujeres,” or prominent women in history, in order to show that women don’t have to be your typical “princess”; in fact, many of these women were so formidable precisely because they went against gender norms and fought for what they believed in.

The Colección Antiprincesas has received a lot of media attention, specifically through channels (blogs, magazines, etc.) that focus on Latinx literature for children, such as Remezcla’s post, These Anti-Princess Books Give Young Girls Badass Latina Heroines to Look up to. Since these new releases have been talked about so much within the children’s literature community, I thought it was a good idea to contribute my views and join in the discussion. Needless to say, we also greatly welcome the input of our readers in fostering a larger, dynamic discussion about this collection and Latinx children’s books in general!

Sobre Marzo: Más Resources for Teaching About Latinx and Latin American Women

Hola a tod@s!

This month we’re joining many around the country in celebrating Women’s History Month. Of course, we hope that the discussion of womyn (past, present, and future) can be constant and valued within the standard curriculum that’s used all year long, but we don’t deny that Women’s History Month provides a timely opportunity to hone in and heighten that effort. More than just acknowledging women, though, we want to draw attention to the diversity of women whose struggles and experiences have led us to the present day. Unfortunately, information that goes beyond the White (largely middle class and US-focused) experience is scarce. It’s rather hard to identify, let alone come by, resources that  shine a light on the breadth and depth of women’s experiences.

While they get some props for trying, even the Smithsonian Education division only goes so far toward remedying the lack of materials. On their Women’s History Teaching Resources site, for instance, they offer materials that focus on African American Women Artists and Native American Women Artists, but make no mention of Hispanic/Latina/Chicana women!  In all honesty, though, the portal was just recently launched and we can only hope that the content is still a work in progress.

On a more positive note, organizations such as Teaching for Change are making significant strides toward diversifying the conversation. Starting March 1st, they’re daily highlighting diverse books featuring women’s accomplishments every day AND offering a 20% discount on book purchases from their non-profit, indie bookstore (code Women2017). Check out their page on “Women’s History Month: A Book Every Day” for the details.

And courtesy of Colours of Us,  blog dedicated to multicultural children’s books, we’ve been enjoying “26 Multicultural Picture Books About Inspiring Women and Girls” and “32 Multicultural Picture Books about Strong Female Role Models”

For our part, we’re going to bring you suggestions for worthwhile children’s and YA literature over the next few weeks, all with the goal of highlighting women’s accomplishments. Stay tuned for our blogging team’s thoughts and contributions! If you’re hard at work diversifying the conversation in your classroom, please share your experiences with us — we’d love to hear what you’re doing to change the world!

En solidaridad,
Keira

¡Mira Look!: Conoce a Gabriela Mistral/ Get to Know Gabriela Mistral

Saludos todos! This week we are starting our March theme of women in children’s literature, in celebration of Women’s History Month. Our book for this week is Get to Know Gabriela Mistral, written by Georgina Lazaro Leon and illustrated by Sara Helena Palacios. This bilingual book is part of a series of “Conoce a…/ Get to Know….” books that provide children with biographies of well-known, and sometimes lesser-known, Hispanic heroes.

Gabriela Mistral was a Chilean author and poet and she was the first Latin American author to win the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1945. Although Mistral is indeed very well-known within the literary community, outside of the literary community she is often eclipsed by some of her twentieth century male contemporaries, such as Pablo Neruda and Jorge Luis Borges. This informative story traces Mistral’s life, both her childhood and her work as a writer, and even introduces readers to some of her lovely poetry, ultimately putting the spotlight on a timeless woman, a Latin American hero and literary icon.

¡Mira Look!: Mango, Abuela and Me

Saludos todos! This week we are concluding the month of March, Women’s History Month, with a sweet, heart-warming tale about a girl, her grandma, and the company of a pet parrot. This week’s book, Mango, Abuela and Me (ages 4-7), written by Meg Medina and illustrated by Angela Dominguez, narrates the beautiful relationship between two generations of women, and the way in which their love and familial bond ultimately surmounts their linguistic and cultural barriers. When the protagonist, Mia’s “far-away Abuela,” comes to live with them in the United States, Mia has to find a way to establish a relationship with her grandmother. Despite Mia’s Spanish not being good enough “to tell her the things an Abuela should know,” and Abuela’s English being “too pequito,” the two find a way to surpass these difficulties and conquer intercultural barriers through love, loyalty, and creativity. While exploring the intercultural challenges that many bicultural children face, this story also celebrates the day-to-day influence of positive, loving women in the lives of young children. Although many of our previous books for this month focused on extolling and celebrating larger-than-life women, this book takes us to a more familiar place: the sweet and simple experiences of an intergenerational family.

The beginning of the story introduces Mia’s Abuela who comes to stay with the family, “leaving behind her sunny house that rested between two snaking rivers.” Although her home country is never named, readers can assume by her knowledge of Spanish that she is from Latin America. Additionally, the description of water and a warm climate may lead readers to assume that she is specifically from the Caribbean. Nonetheless, the lack of specificity enables a variety of readers from a variety of backgrounds to identify with Mia and her “far-away” Abuela. Although, of course, the immigrant experience is different for everyone, this book captures many of the familiar struggles of adapting to a new language and new home. Even I, for example, having a grandmother who lives in France, can identify with this story and the perplexing contradictions of familial closeness and cultural dissonance.

WWW: Social Justice through Music: Suni Paz and Her Música con Conciencia

Thanks to Alice’s review of Margarita Engle’s Drum Dream Girl, we’re inspired this week to feature another woman from Latin America who’s used music as a tool for social justice. In the case of Drum Dream Girl, we learn about the Chinese-African-Cuban drummer, Millo Castro Zaldarriaga, who broke gender divisions in Cuba during the mid-20^th century when drumming was believed to be a man’s purview. For this post, we want to draw your attention to another real-life woman, Suni Paz, an Argentinean singer and songwriter who has similarly used music as a tool for social change.

Much like Millo, Paz seems to have been born a musician, and one with a natural talent for teaching and sharing her music with others. Earlier in her life, during the 1960s and ‘70s, she used her music as a tool for engaging in social protest, singing in support, as Smithsonian Folkways describes it, “of United Farm Workers movement, dignity and freedom for Latina women, amnesty for Latin American political prisoners, and education for Latino children in the United States.” Later in life, she adapted her social consciousness-raising music to better suit children and classrooms, spreading her joy of Latin American culture and language among audiences spread throughout the Americas. A unique collaboration with two authors, Alma Flor Ada and F. Isabel Campoy (whom we deeply admire), introduced her moving music to many more young people.

¡Mira Look!: Drum Dream Girl by Margarita Engle

Saludos, todos! This week we are featuring Drum Dream Girl: How One Girl’s Courage Changed Music, written by Margarita Engle and illustrated by Rafael López. As some of you may remember, we recently featured Margarita Engle in our Author’s Corner, where we gave you some biographical information, as well as some resources for exploring and teaching some of her works in young adult and children’s literature. In Drum Dream Girl, Engle does not cease to amaze us yet again. With Drum Dream Girl (ages 3-8) we continue our March celebration of Women’s History Month and our theme of women’s rights and experiences in children’s literature, by focusing on the story of a lesser-known historical figure. Through her beautiful poetic prose, Engle tells the biographical tale of a young, Cuban girl who counters gender norms in order to become one of Cuba’s most iconic female drummers.

López’s stunning illustrations complement Engle’s lyrical prose in a culmination of female empowerment and pride. As illustrator López dedicates the book to his “architect mother, Pilo, whose courage opened the ceiling above her dreams,” readers are reminded of the strength and brilliance of older generations of women, paving the way towards freedom and rights for younger generations. This book strongly resonates with the legacy of women’s rights and empowerment throughout history, in the Americas and beyond.

Drum Dream Girl is based on the true story of Millo Castro Zaldarriaga, a Chinese-African-Cuban girl living in the 1930s who successfully struggled against the social stigma for female drummers, becoming one of Cuba’s great, historic musicians. Engle narrates the tale through concise, lyrical writing, consistent with her style of fusing poetry and prose: “But everyone/ on the island of music/ in the city of drumbeats/ believed that only boys/ should play drums/ so the drum dream girl/ had to keep dreaming/ quiet/ secret/ drumbeat/ dreams.” This style is both easy for younger readers to follow and digest, and lyrically pleasing for older readers or adults.

WWW: International Women’s Day and Women Today!

¡Feliz viernes a todos!

Thank you for joining me today! Somehow this week escaped me and so I don’t have such a long post for you. I did, however, manage to find this video from The Guardian that showcases some important women from all over the world who are making a difference in the lives of the people around them hoy en día.

We think this video ties in the themes of activism and important women in history, and could be used in class with older groups to discuss changes students wish they could see in their own worlds.  Join me again next week for a longer post on women’s rights in South America, Berta Cáceres, and the Zika Virus!

With warmest wishes,

Charla

Reading Roundup: 10 Books about Latin American and Latina Women

 

 

¡Buenos días!

I hope everyone is having a great week! Beginning this month, we will be bringing you our Reading Roundup list at the beginning of the month, so that you’ll have more time to include them in your classroom themes. Nonetheless, we hope you are able to incorporate these books into your classes all year long! As Keira explained in her Sobre Marzo post, we are celebrating Women’s History Month and I therefore present to you books with strong Latin American and Latina female characters While this list cannot possibly encompass all of the wonderful books out there with positive women role models, we hope that it can be a start. In addition, if you have any relevant books to suggest, please comment and let us know! In this Reading Roundup, we aim at encompassing a mix of both well-known and everyday women’s narratives. In addition, all of the authors are women. While the majority of these books do not delve deeply into the complexity of gender, gender roles and expectations are addressed in a few of the young adult books listed, like in Gabi, A Girl in Pieces and Under the Mesquite. We hope that you enjoy these books and find them valuable for your classrooms!

¡Saludos!
Kalyn