Week 11 - Historical Realism!

 Hello Professor and classmates! This week, I evaluate the realism genre in children's fiction, let's begin! 

    Rinaldi, Ann. 

    Dear America: My Heart Is on the Ground: The Diary of Nannie Little Rose, a Sioux Girl. Scholastic, Inc., 1999. 

    ISBN 0-590-14922-9 

   

    My Heart is on the Ground: The Diary of Nannie Little Rose by Ann Rinaldi, is a historical fiction set in 1880, which tells the story of protagonist Little Rose, a twelve-year-old Sioux girl who is taken from her home and parents with her older brother Charles, to be forcibly enrolled in the Indian School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. The story is told from first-person perspective as Little Rose writes in her diary about her experiences at the school. Little Rose makes friends and enjoys her diary writing, but has her culture, language and other connections to her Sioux heritage strongly discouraged by the institution throughout her year there, to be replaced with White European American customs of the late 1800s. Rinaldi’s novel deals with themes regarding racism, oppression, forced assimilation and shedding light on the far-reaching consequences of American colonization from the point of view of someone who is directly, negatively impacted as a member of minority. However, the novel also has a theme of finding joy in even in incredibly difficult circumstances, such as Little Rose making friends at the school, and her dream of becoming a schoolteacher for the children of her tribe’s reservation when she graduates.

    Rinaldi comes across in her text as having had good intentions when writing her historical fiction. The author discusses in her author’s notes being horrified learning about the terrible conditions that Native American children were forced by the government to experience at the Indian schools, believing that the perspectives of the children needed to be shared through her work. Rinaldi appears to have genuinely tried to convey the time period, geographically, and historical context of the Indian schools in the late 1800s Pennsylvania with accuracy. Although there are no bibliographies, timeline or glossaries, Rinaldi includes historical notes within the back of the book about her research, depicting photographs and records of the Indian school, along with acknowledgements in her anthropology research and fact-checking on the Lakota Sioux people. I feel Rinaldi tried to be sensitive in her characterization of Little Rose, and her friends, but the writing still comes across as stereotypical in its depiction of indigenous characters, their relation to white characters, and the portrayal of Native American history. The style of writing felt as though it was reinforcing harmful stereotypes about indigenous American people and ultimately glosses over the many issues of the Indian school by the story’s end.

 

 

     Kadohata, Cynthia, and Julia Kuo. A Place to Belong. 

    Simon & Schuster, 2019. ISBN 978-1-4814-4664-8

 

 

    A Place to Belong by Cynthia Kadohata is a historical fiction novel, set in the early 1940s and tells the story of twelve-year-old, Japanese American protagonist, Hanako Tachibana, as she, her little brother Akira, and their parents move to Japan to live with her grandparents after the family is uprooted from their lives due to World War II, having lost their home and restaurant in Los Angeles after spending four years in Japanese prison camps. This is especially confusing for Hanako who was always encouraged by her parents to focus on her North American culture over her Japanese heritage in order to fit in with white European American customs, but is now leaving America for Japan, a nation, culture, and family members that are all unfamiliar to Hanako. Harder yet, is that the farming community that Hanako’s family moves to in the countryside is outside of Hiroshima, where people everywhere are still suffering from the aftermath of injuries and mass destruction caused by the bombings.

    A Place to Belong is an incredibly moving work of historical fiction, written from the perspective of Japanese American author, Kadohata, with careful thought, research, love and consideration for the Japanese American people who experienced the hardships in the aftermath of World War II shining through on each page of the novel. Although there are no bibliographies, the author’s afternotes convey that Kadohata put extensive research on the life experiences of Japanese Americans in the 1940a, with the context of the historical, Japanese culture, geographically and politics in the aftermath of World War II coming across clearly in style of the writing and depiction of the setting. The characters come across as three-dimensional and realistic, with Hana’s bond with her grandparents in particular, being very heartwarming. A Place to Belong deals with the theme of loss and despair, but also about having hope and love of family during difficult times, as Hana struggles with adjusting to life in post-war Japan, but ultimately finds connection in her new community that brings her happiness.   

    Williams-Garcia, Rita. One Crazy Summer. 

    Amistad, an Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, 2019.

    ISBN 978-0-06-076088-5

One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia is a middle grade historical fiction which tells the story of eleven-year-old, African American protagonist, Delphine, and her little sisters, Vonetta and Fern, as they fly from Brooklyn, New York to Oakland, California in the Summer of 1968, to visit their mother who had abandoned them and their father. Unfortunately for the three sisters, their mother acts indifferent to her children, treating their visit as an inconvenience in her life at best, and directs the girls to a summer camp at the local community center, run by members of the Black Panthers organization. Soon, the girls find themselves making friends at the community center and taking part in local politics.

    Williams-Garcia’s One Crazy Summer is an incredible novel for older children, as it introduces history of the Black Panthers and the civil rights movement of the late 1960s through the fictional lens of the child protagonist’s perspective. There is genuine heart, humor and care in Williams-Garcia’s writing with fully realized, three-dimensional characters on the page, with Delphine’s struggle with having to grow up too quickly by being a mother figure to her younger sisters, her culture shock from her life in Brooklyn to being in California, and her conflicted feelings towards her mother, all combined to create a great protagonist and supporting characters throughout the book. Within her acknowledgements page, author Williams-Garcia reflects upon the girls and women in her own life who inspired the book, while also recognizing that the story and time period in American history she wanted to tell had required extensive research on her part as the author, having gone through records, interviews and articles on the experiences of African American people who lived in the 1960s era or had been connected to the Black Panthers movement in history. Williams-Garcia’s writing feels reflective of the late 1960s period, as the history and culture of that decade, focused on the perspective of African American families who lived through it, comes to life in the narrative.   The themes of becoming a positive force change in the world, finding empowerment as a young girl, having pride in one’s identity, and broadening one’s perspective are all great talking points for child readers, just as the protagonist Delphine discovers on her hero’s journey throughout the novel.