Promoting Positive Civic Values Through the Critical Analysis of Multimodal Texts Centering on Refugee and Immigrant Experiences

Like many of us, Jon Callow (2017), a senior lecturer at the University of Sydney, believes strongly that “literature plays a role in the way we inculcate positive civic and social values” (p.231). He argues that the humanity of refugees and immigrants is often overlooked in the contemporary, global, political climate, and that this neglect promotes harmful stereotypes and resentment. As a way of combating such pervasive tendencies, Callow recommends critically discussing the images and words represented in children’s picture books depicting immigrant and refugee experiences.

In a recent study, he interviewed 11 primary students between the ages of five and seven about inferred author and illustrator choices as well as positions of power represented in a two-page spread taken from the book, My Two Blankets. My Two Blankets (Kobald, 2014) is about a young girl, Cartwheel, who moves to a new place where she does not speak the dominant language. Using “the metaphor of language as a blanket,” Cartwheel is comforted initially by the blanket of her first language; however, over time, Cartwheel creates and embraces a second blanket comprised of her second language (Callow, 2017, p.232).

Students’ responses to researcher questions provided evidence of their emerging awareness of intentional decisions made by the author and illustrator, or “authorial choice” (Callow, 2017, p.234).  For example, in reference to Cartwheel’s physical distance from the native speakers portrayed in the two-page spread, a student named Chris remarked, “the author is trying to tell us that she feels left out, or she doesn’t want to be really close” (Callow, 2017, p.234). In another example, the researcher asked students why the author and illustrator used the image of a waterfall in the book to which a child named Kelly, replied “Because it’s like a waterfall of loneliness … it’s spreading out to other people so they know how lonely they are feeling” (Callow, 2017, p.235).

In sum, Callow’s (2017) investigation highlights several ways young children can critically analyze complex multimodal text. When educators engage students in discussions specific to author and illustrator decisions and power relations, they enhance students’ critical literacy skills. Critical literacy, in turn, promotes more adaptive social and civic values. In addition to My Two Blankets, Callow (2017) recommends the following books centered on refugee and immigrant experiences for use with elementary-aged children:

The Little Refugee by Anh Do and Suzanne Do

Mirror by Jeannie Baker

The Treasure Box by Margaret Wild

For more ideas about promoting critical literacy in the classroom, check out Vivian Vasquez’s (2016) recent book, Critical Literacy Across the K-6 Curriculum.

Callow, J. (2017). “Nobody spoke like I did”: Picture books, critical literacy and global contexts. The Reading Teacher, 71(2), 231-237.

Kobald, I. (2014). My two blankets. Richmond, VIC, Australia: Little Hare.

Vasquez, V. M. (2016) Critical literacy across the K-6 curriculum. New York, NY: Routledge.