Laura Ingalls Wilder's name pulled from library award over 'stereotypical

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This makes me so sad. I tackle Little House on the Prairie every semester in a unit on controversial children’s literature and we get into the ugly depictions of Native Americans included in this novel, consider how to treat them with children, etc. But Laura (the young character) consistently challenges the racist attitudes of the adults around her. And it’s important for our country to actually address the less flattering aspects of its history. 😥
 
gracepoole said:
And it’s important for our country to actually address the less flattering aspects of its history.
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I bet you that people will refer to this period in history with some disdain in the future.

People will ask, “Why didn’t they stop such and such?” “How stupid were people in the early 21st century?”
 
Every period of time has its travesties. Abortion, drugs, human trafficking genocide ect. that’s some of the stuff this period will be known for.
 
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Cruciferi said:
Every period of time has its travesties. Abortion, drugs, human trafficking genocide ect. that’s some of the stuff this period will be known for.
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and of course the horror often goes both ways and different people in the past have had reason to fear other groups given their own experiences. I haven’t read the book but it is often a ploy by the author to challenge (or check) attitudes through the voice of a child.

A discussion happens between two sides and very often both sides have valid points. I think it is a step backwards to view history from the suffering of one group and ignore the more broader reality.
 
Interesting how we can just rewrite history, or just remove something we don’t agree with, like it never existed. I am not sure what exactly was deemed so horribly offensive but what ever it was, it was a depiction of life as it was through someone who lived during that time, not as political correctness of today wants it to be.
 
Well Ingalls is getting the full Stalinist treatment of slipping down the memory hole. In a few years you won’t find her books in the public library or anywhere else.
 
stevegravy said:
Well Ingalls is getting the full Stalinist treatment of slipping down the memory hole. In a few years you won’t find her books in the public library or anywhere else.
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Doubtful. First, LHOP is a cottage industry that’s in no danger of going anywhere. Second, there’s no government branch responsible for censoring books.
 
and that is so sad when you think of the millions of girls who grew up reading her books.
i was probably 9 or 10 and yet i realized i was reading about something that took place in a different time in history and did not apply to the time and people (the 1960’s) in which i was living.
these people do not give credit to the readers.
 
What are you talking about?

Hate to say it but if you review the ALA’s lists of the most commonly challenged children’s books, it’s a smorgasbord of conservative leaning folks bashing books they think shouldn’t be in the hands of children.
 
i just think we should stop trying to change, hide, ignore or run from our history. we learn from our history.
 
gracepoole said:
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7_Sorrows:
i just think we should stop trying to change, hide, ignore or run from our history. we learn from our history.
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I agree!

Those books offer a remarkable look into the past.
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both good and bad…
 
especially to the girls. i pictured myself on the prairie with her and since i grew up in Kansas i would daydream about what life was like back then. i always felt i was born in the wrong point in history - instead of 1952, i should have been born 80 years earlier!
 
i live just a few miles from the largest Indian reservation in the country. Good heavens, I shop at the same stores, eat at the same restaurants, sit in the same movie theatres with the Navajo and Hopi.
if i had been negatively affected by reading the books of Laura Ingalls Wilder
I wouldn’t be able to leave my house.
i see the Native American men wearing there caps saying they are a veteran of WWII, the Korean War, the Viet Nam war or some other and i am only reminded of how they have bravely fought on behalf of our country.
 
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