KAY E. VANDERGRIFT
Contemporary picture books provide opportunities for young people to encounter strong female voices in a variety of times, places, roles, and literary styles. The following books go beyond just having female protagonists. They are not only gender-fair; they are multicultural, international, and represent a diversity of ages, classes, and personalities. Some assist us in the process of recovering women’s history, others celebrate women’s forms of expression, others tell of a girl’s relationship with her mother or father, and still others offer a new perspective on the older woman in the lives of children.
PICTURE BOOKS WITH FEMALE VOICES
Belton, Sandra. From Miss Ida’s Porch. Illus. Floyd Cooper. New York: Four Winds, 1993.
Blumberg, Rhoda. Bloomers! Illus. Mary Morgan. New York: Bradbury, 1993.
Boulton, Jane, selector. Only Opal: The Diary of a Young Girl. Illus. Barbara Cooney. New York: Philomel, 1994.
Brisson, Pat. Wanda’s Roses. Illus. Maryann Cocca-Leffler. Honesdale, PA: Boyds Mills Press, 1994.
Coerr, Eleanor. Sadako. Illus. by Ed Young. New York: Putnam, 1993.
Cooney, Barbara. Hattie and the Wild Waves: A Story from Brooklyn. New York: Viking, 1990.
Cooney, Barbara. Miss Rumphius. New York: Viking, 1982.
Cooney, Barbara. Eleanor. New York: Viking, 1996.
Gray, Libba Moore. My Mama Had A Dancing Heart. Illus. by Raul Colon. New York: Orchard, 1995.
Friend, Catherine. My Head Is Full of Colors. Illus. Kiki. New York: Hyperion, 1994.
Hoffman, Mary. Amazing Grace. Illus. Caroline Binch. New York: Dial, 1991.
Hopkinson, Deborah. Sweet Clara and the Freedom Quilt. Illus. James Ransome. New York: Alfred Knopf, 1993.
Howard, Elizabeth Fitzgerald. Chita’s Christmas Tree. Illus. Floyd Cooper. New York: Bradbury Press, 1989.
Johnson, Dolores. Now Let Me Fly: The Story of a Slave Family. New York: Macmillan, 1993.
Johnson, Dolores. Papa’s Stories. New York: Macmillan, 1994.
Lasky, Kathryn. Sea Swan. Illus. Catherine Stock. New York: Macmillan, 1988.
Lasky, Kathryn. She’s Wearing a Dead Bird on Her Head! Illus. by David Catrow. New York: Hyperion, 1995.
LeGuin, Ursula K. A Ride on the Red Mare’s Back. Illus. Julie Downing. New York: Orchard, 1992.
Lowell, Susan. Little Red Cowboy Hat. Illus. by Randy Cecil. New York: Holt, 1997.
McCully, Emily Arnold. Mirette on the High Wire. New York: Putnam, 1992.
McCully, Emily Arnold. The Bobbin Girl. New York: Dial, 1996.
McKissack, Patricia C. Mirandy and Brother Wind. Illus. Jerry Pinkney. New York: Alfred Knopf, 1988.
McKissack, Patricia C. Nettie Jo’s Friends. Illus. Scott Cook. New York: Alfred Knopf, 1989.
McLerran, Alice. Roxaboxen. Illus. Barbara Cooney. New York: Lothrop, 1991.
Martin, Jacqueline Briggs. Grandmother Bryant’s Pocket. Illus. by Petra Mathers. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin, 1996.
Mathers, Petra. Kisses from Rosa. New York: Apple Soup Books/Knopf, 1995.
Martin, C. L. G. Three Brave Women. Illus. Peter Elwell. New York: Macmillan, 1991.
Medearis, Angela Shelf. Our People. Illus. Michael Bryant. New York: Atheneum, 1994.
Merriam, Eve. The Wise Woman and Her Secret. Illus. Linda Graves. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991.
Merrill, Jean. The Girl Who Loved Caterpillars. Illus. by Floyd Cooper. New York: Philomel, 1992.
Moss, Thylias. I Want To Be. Illus. Jerry Pinkney. New York: Dial, 1993.
Nivola, Claire A. Elisabeth. New York: Frances Foster Books/Farrar Straus & Giroux, 1997.
Paterson, Katherine. The King’s Equal. Illus. Vladimir Vagin. New York: HarperCollins, 1992.
Polacco, Patricia. Babushka Baba Yaga. New York: New York: Philomel, 1993.
Polacco, Patricia. Boat Ride with Lillian Two Blossom. New York: Philomel, 1988.
Polacco, Patricia.. The Keeping Quilt. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1988.
Polacco, Patricia. Thunder Cake. New York: Philomel, 1990.
Ringgold, Faith. Aunt Harriet’s Underground Railroad in the Sky. New York: Crown, 1992.
Ringgold, Faith. Dinner at Aunt Connie’s House. New York: Hyperion, 1993.
Ringgold, Faith. Tar Beach. New York: New York: Crown, 1991.
Rosenberg, Liz. Grandmother and the Runaway Shadow. Illus. by Beth Peck. San Diego, CA: Harcourt Brace, 1996.
Rylant, Cynthia. When I Was Young in the Mountains. Illus. Diane Goode. New York: Dutton, 1982.
Sasso, Sandy Eisenberg. But God Remembered: Stories of Women from Creation to the Promised Land. Illus. by Bethanne Anderson. Woodstock, VT: Jewish Lights, 1995.
Schertle, Alice. Down the Road. Illus. E.B. Lewis. San Diego. CA: Browndeer Press/Harcourt Brace, 1995.
Stops, Sue. Dulcie Dando, Soccer Star. Illus. Debi Gliori. New York: Holt, 1992.
Thomas, Jane Resh. Lights on the River. Illus. Michael Dooling. New York: Hyperion, 1994.
Thomas, Joyce Carol. Brown Honey in Broomwheat Tea. Illus. Floyd Cooper. New York: HarperCollins, 1993.
Turner, Ann. Sewing Quilts. Illus. Thomas B. Allen. New York: Macmillan, 1994.
Uchida, Yoshiko. The Bracelet. Illus. Joanna Yardley. New York: Philomel, 1993.
Uchida, Yoshiko. The Wise Old Woman. Illus. Martin Springett. New York: Margaret McElderry, 1994.
Williams, Sherley Anne. Working Cotton. Illus. Carole Byard. San Diego, CA: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1992.
Williams, Vera B. A Chair for My Mother. New York: Greenwillow, 1982.
Williams, Vera B. Something Special for Me. New York: Greenwillow, 1983.
Yolen, Jane. Letting Swift River Go. Illus. Barbara Cooney. Boston, MA: Little Brown, 1992.
BACKGROUND READINGS ON FEMALE VOICES
American Association of University Women and Wellesley College Center for Research on Women. How Schools Shortchange Girls. Washington, DC: AAUW Education Foundation, 1992.
Bauermeister, Erica and Holly Smith. Let’s Hear It for the Girls: 375 Great Books for Readers 2-14. New York: Penguin, 1997.
Belenky, Mary Field and Others. Women’s Ways of Knowing: The Development of Self, Voice, and the Mind. New York: Basic Books, 1986.
The Girl Child: An Investment in the Future. A Project of the UNICEF Ontario Education for Development Committee. Ontario, CA: UNICEF/Ontario, 1994.
Goldberger, Nancy and others., eds. Knowledge, Difference, and Power: Essays Inspired by Women’s Ways of Knowing. New York: Harper, 1996.
Hancock, Emily. The Girl Within. New York: Fawcett Columbine, 1989.
Heilbrun, Carolyn G. Writing A Woman’s Life. New York: Random House, 1988.
Mann, Judy. The Difference: Growing Up Female in America. New York: Time Warner, 1994.
Mills, Sara, ed. Gendering the Reader. New York: Harvester/Wheatsheaf, 1994.
Moraga Cherrie and Gloria Anzaldua, eds. This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color. 2nd. ed. Latham, NY: Kitchen Table, Women of Color Press, 1983.
Morton, Patricia. Disfigured Images: The Historical Assault on Afro-American Women. Westport, CT: Praeger, 1991.
Odean, Kathleen. Great Books for Girls. New York: Ballantine, 1997.
Orenstein, Peggy. School Girls: Young Women, Self-Esteem, and the Confidence Gap. New York: Doubleday, 1994.
Perry, Theresa and James W. Fraser, eds. Freedom’s Plow: Teaching in the Multicultural Classroom. New York: Routledge, 1993.
Polster, Miriam F. Eve’s Daughters: The Forbidden Heroism of Women. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 1992.
Ruiz, Vicki and Ellen Carol DuBois, eds. Unequal Sisters: A Multicultural Reader in U.S. Women’s History. 2nd edition. New York: Routledge, 1994.
Sadker, Myra and David Sadker. Failing at Fairness: How America’s Schools Cheat Girls. New York: Charles Scribner’s, 1994.
Stone, Lynda, ed. The Education Feminism Reader. New York: Routledge, 1994.
Thorne, Barrie. Gender Play: Girls and Boys in School. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1993.
Vandergrift, Kay E. “A Feminist Perspective on Multicultural Children’s Literature in the Middle Years of the Twentieth Century,” Library Trends. Vol. 41 (Winter 1993): 354-377.
Vandergrift, Kay E. “A Feminist Research Agenda in Youth Literature,” Wilson Library Bulletin. Vol. 68 (October, 1993): 23-27.
Vandergrift, Kay E.. “And Bid Her Sing: A White Feminist Reads African-American Female Poets,” in African-American Voices in Young Adult Literature: Tradition, Transition, Transformation. Karen P. Smith, ed. Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1994, pp.31-77.
Vandergrift, Kay E. “Peacocks, Dreams, Quilts, and Honey: Patricia Polacco, A Woman’s Voice of Remembrance,” in Ways of Knowing: Literature and the Intellectual Life of Children. ed. by Kay E. Vandergrift. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 1996, pp. 259-288.
Vandergrift, Kay E. “Journey or Destination: Female Voices in Youth Literature,” in Mosaics of Meaning: Enhancing the Intellectual Life of Young Adults Through Story. ed. by Kay E. Vandergrift. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 1996, pp. 17-45.
Weis, Lois and Michelle Fine, eds. Beyond Silenced Voices: Class, Race, and Gender in United States Schools. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1993.
Zinsser, Judith. History and Feminism: A Glass Half Full. New York: Twayne, 1993.