Picturebooks (and silent books, with images only and without words) are children’s books commonly considered suitable only for young children of pre-school age or in the earliest years of schooling. For this reason, picturebooks are mostly neglected in teaching in higher educational stages. Nevertheless, the educational potential of picturebooks is considerable, especially in the later years of primary school. For example, in Italian language teaching, they can be extraordinary tools for planning didactic projects that allow instructors to integrate the teaching/learning of all linguistic skills and of metalinguistic reflection, which are the main elements in the curricula related to Italian language teaching in Italian-speaking countries and contexts. The article aims to show the validity of the above claim by establishing a possible classification of picturebooks into six distinct types and by describing some didactic projects and activities developed in primary schools in Canton Ticino (Italian Switzerland). Focusing on the pleasure of reading engaging stories and on motivation, picturebooks enable teachers to pursue ambitious and challenging goals, such as creating one or more new picturebooks inspired by the one read initially or transposing a picturebook into a theatre script. At the same time, picturebooks enable students to develop their speaking, listening, reading, and writing skills.
IT
Gli albi illustrati (e la variante dei silent books, cioè gli albi di sole immagini) sono libri per l’infanzia considerati da molti idonei solo ai bambini in età prescolare o nei primissimi anni di scolarizzazione, e per questo per lo più trascurati a livello di insegnamento negli ordini scolastici successivi. In realtà, le potenzialità didattiche degli albi illustrati, caratterizzati negli esempi più riusciti da un perfetto connubio tra parole e immagini, sono enormi, in particolare per la scuola primaria: per ciò che riguarda la didattica dell’italiano, ad esempio, si rivelano dei supporti straordinari per un’impostazione di tipo progettuale che permetta di integrare l’insegnamento/apprendimento di tutte le abilità linguistiche e della riflessione sulla lingua, cioè dei perni sui quali si reggono i programmi e i piani di studio relativi alla lingua italiana dei paesi e dei contesti italofoni. L’articolo si propone di sostanziare questa convinzione attraverso la definizione di una possibile classificazione degli albi illustrati in sei distinte tipologie e la contestuale descrizione di alcuni percorsi didattici sviluppati in scuole primarie del Canton Ticino (Svizzera italiana), incentrati sull’utilizzo di albi illustrati. Puntando sul piacere di leggere storie coinvolgenti e sulla motivazione, l’albo illustrato consente di lavorare in vista di obiettivi ambiziosi e stimolanti (ad esempio, la redazione di uno o più albi illustrati nuovi, ispirati a quello scelto all’inizio del percorso, oppure la trasposizione teatrale del testo di partenza), puntando nel contempo a sviluppare le competenze degli allievi per ciò che riguarda il parlato e l’ascolto, la lettura e la scrittura.
This analysis aims to describe the main features of hypermedia literary apps for children by considering a corpus of adaptations of classic and contemporary picturebooks. In particular, it highlights the multimodal nature that defines hypermedia texts and their meanings, as well as the interactivity that programs different degrees of readers’ involvement and the various ways of using and exploring the virtual space of touchscreens. By describing some hypermedia features deployed in a selection of classic texts, I focus on the hypermedia adaptations of three contemporary Italian picturebooks: Iole, la balena mangiaparole by Gioia Marchegiani, Amico ragnolo by gloria francella, and Love, the App by Alberto Vanni. These were chosen to illustrate the significant literary use of several textual materials, the implementation of different types of interactivity, and the recreation of the material characteristics of the print edition through the virtual page. Founded on the appropriation and re-interpretation of the source, the adaptations considered here show a mix of literary intents and digital technologies, while highlighting the substantial homogeneity of the hypermedia strategies used in adapting classic and contemporary texts
IT
Considerando un corpus di adattamenti di opere classiche e di albi contemporanei italiani, il lavoro si propone di determinare alcune caratteristiche della letteratura ipermediale per l’infanzia. Saranno in particolar modo esaminati i tessuti compositi e multimodali che costituiscono il testo ipermediale e permettono di costruirne il senso; l’interattività, che prevede diversi gradi di coinvolgimento del lettore; alcuni modi di utilizzo ed esplorazione degli spazi virtuali degli schermi tattili. Muovendo dall’esame dei dispositivi in opera in una rosa di trasposizioni di testi classici, ci si soffermerà in particolare sulle versioni ipermediali degli albi contemporanei di Gioia Marchegiani (Iole, la balena mangiaparole), Gloria Francella (Amico ragnolo) e Alberto Vanni (Love, the App), scelti rispettivamente per illustrare la molteplicità di materie testuali, il ricorso a diverse tipologie di elementi interattivi e un uso degli spazi della pagina virtuali tale da restituire le caratteristiche materiali delle edizioni cartacee. Fondati sull’appropriazione-interpretazione di elementi testuali e sull’utilizzo a fini narrativi delle possibilità tecnologiche fornite dagli schermi tattili, gli adattamenti ipermediali qui considerati permettono di verificare al contempo l’ipotesi della sostanziale omogeneità di strategie e dispositivi ipermediali in uso nelle due categorie di testi, indipendentemente dalla loro diversa legittimità patrimoniale.
In Portugal, the suffering and struggle of the East Timorese people for independence started a social movement of solidarity with strong repercussions in the arts, namely music and literature. Children’s Literature depicted the theme of this period of oppression in East Timor, as well as the recognition of its independence and its right to freedom, in a picturebook selected for the White Ravens List in 2003 called East Timor – Island of the Rising Sun (2001), by João Pedro Mésseder and André Letria. This unusual picturebook, characterised by a very simple and sparse, almost poetic, text combined with large-format pictures, depicts this chapter of the contemporary history of East Timor in very specific way, resembling fairy tales or legends. The text and images are combined in order to promote symbolic readings, suggesting a magical/mystical environment that impresses readers. More than a decade later, recent struggles and stories from East Timor are still present in Portuguese picturebooks such as Lya/Lia (2014), by Margarida Botelho. The social change, path to democracy and educational development, as well as daily life and children’s pastimes are now the centre of a narrative that establishes the similarities and differences between modern-day Portugal and East Timor. Our aim is to analyse both the political and ideological perspectives present in these picturebooks aimed at very young readers, offering a broad vision of different realities and contexts, even when they deal with war, death and suffering, as was the case of the East Timorese fight for independence.
This article analyses the question of ethics in war circumstances as portrayed in two picturebooks: The Enemy by Davide Cali and Serge Bloch, and I will not by Naila Farouky and Ora Eitan. Aiming to prove that there are some children’s books capable of tackling complex moral issues, it looks at the underlying attitudes (for instance, the implied concept of the child reader) and artistic devices employed in these books (such as irony, conceit, rhetoric), which allowed the artists to talk about challenging issues with conviction, frankness, and most importantly, with moral insight.
PL
Artykuł mówi o szczerości jako możliwej postawie artystycznej w książkach obrazkowych podejmujących tematykę wojny. Davide Cali i Serge Bloch (The Enemy, pol. Wróg) oraz Naila Farouky i Ora Eitan (I Will Not, pol. Nie będę) budują skomplikowane narracje emocjonalne i etyczne, wskazując tym samym na potencjalną dojrzałość młodych czytelników. Autorzy stworzyli książki wymagające zarówno pod względem artystycznym, jak i etycznym.
This paper aims to explore how Norwegian picturebooks published in Poland in the years 2008-2018 are presented in publishers' blurbs and adult readers' online reviews. The study is grounded in Scandinavian theory of literature mediation and it makes particular use of the concept of public epitexts. Drawing on research on contemporary Scandinavian picturebooks, the paper identifies the most frequently highlighted aspects of the works discussed in the analysed text corpus. Based on this, the author distinguishes between two strategies of book selection represented among the Polish publishers and attempts to map out an image of the Norwegian picturebooks in the Polish adult audience.
For many years the media have presented the rainforest as a fascinating and exotic place, abundant in various species of plants and animals, the home of people decorated with feathers or holding spears. Picturebooks are no exception. This article presents the ways a popular image of the Amazon forest is produced in picturebooks for young readers in English-speaking industrialised societies. The analysis shows that shaping knowledge about the tropical forest is based on stereotypes about the “untouched pristine forest” populated by “wild indigenous people” – a notion that is spurious. Some of these books undertake the subject of indigenous knowledge or the loss of cultural identity. However the presentation of these issues often lacks deeper dimensions. The exoticisation of rainforest inhabitants as well as the forest itself may have a negative impact on young readers’ understanding of the cultural diversity of the Amazon, as well as their understanding of the complexity of indigenous peoples’ lives.
This article examines how the child consumer is represented in a selection of branded picturebooks at the beginning of the 20th century. By analyzing children’s books published by a commercial chain of stores, the Cooperation Union, the article discusses how depictions of children as consumers are connected to the development of the emerging mass market and consumer society. The new ideas and marketing strategies expressed in these books also coincide with fundamental social changes in society, resulting from modernity and new technologies. Although the Cooperation books were designed for children and used familiar narrative techniques and motifs within children’s literature, I will argue that the books had a twofold audience. They were not only aimed at children but also at their parents. Representations of children as consumers in the studied material suggest that consumption is strongly connected to ideas of modernity and to representations of the modern child, but also that consumption is described as an inseparable part of the modern, urban experience.
Some of Mauri Kunnas’s picturebooks are examined as bearers of Finnish cultural heritage. His Doghill series conveys heritage by describing country life in 19th-century western Finland. Kunnas’s The Canine Kalevala is an adaptation of the Finnish epic The Kalevala and also includes several adaptations of Akseli Gallen-Kallela’s Kalevala paintings. Both The Kalevala and the paintings of Gallen-Kallela, held in high esteem in Finland, are adapted for child readers by Kunnas, who retells the story by using animal characters, omits problematic issues and adds humour to make it more appropriate for children. An informed adult reader reads The Canine Kalevala as an adaptation of The Kalevala, with an understanding of complex cultural and literary references, while a child reader sees the book as a new, exciting story.
HR
U radu se neke od slikovnica svjetski poznatoga i istaknutoga finskoga autora Maurija Kunnasa analiziraju kao nositeljice finske kulturne baštine. Njegova serija slikovnica Koiramäki, u engleskome prijevodu Doghill [Pseće brdo], predstavlja baštinu opisujući seoski život na zapadu Finske u 19. stoljeću. Kunnasova slikovnica Koirien Kalevala, engleski The Canine Kalevala [Pseća Kalevala], adaptacija je finskoga epa Kalevala te uključuje i nekoliko adaptacija slika Akselija Gallen-Kallele nadahnutih Kalevalom. I ep i slike Gallen-Kallele u Finskoj su vrlo cijenjeni, a Kunnas ih prilagođava dječjim čitateljima posežući za životinjskim likovima, izbjegavajući problematične teme i dodajući humor u svoja prepričavanja. Upućeni odrasli čitatelj slikovnicu The Canine Kalevala čita kao adaptaciju Kalevale, s razumijevanjem složenih kulturnih i književnih referencija, dok dječji čitatelj u knjizi vidi novu i uzbudljivu priču.
DE
Im Beitrag werden einige der Bilderbücher des weltbekannten finnischen Autors Mauri Kunnas als Träger des finnischen Kulturerbes untersucht. Seine Bilderbuchserie Koiramäki [dt. Hundeberg] stellt einen Beitrag zur Erhaltung des finnischen kulturellen Erbes dar, weil darin das Bauernleben im Norden Finnlands des 19. Jahrhunderts beschrieben wird. Das Bilderbuch von Kunnas unter dem Titel Koirien Kalevala [dt. Hundekalevala] ist eine Adaption des finnischen Kalevala-Epos und enthält einige Adaptionen der durch diesen Epos inspirierten Bilder von Akseli Gallen-Kallela. Sowohl der Epos als auch die Bilder von Gallen-Kallela werden in Finnland sehr geschätzt. Kunnas passt diese an die Fähigkeiten der junge Leser an, indem er in der Nacherzählung des Epos nach Tiergestalten greift, problematische Themen vermeidet und das Erzählte mit viel Humor ausstattet. Der schon versierte erwachsene Leser liest das Bilderbuch Koirien Kalevala als eine KalevalaAdaption mit Verständnis für die darin enthaltenen komplexen kulturellen und literarischen Bezüge, während der junge Leser im Buch eine neue und aufregende Geschichte entdeckt.
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