Barnboken – Journal of Children's Literature Research
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Ljudlitteratur med buller och bång : En nygammal barnlitterär genre
No full textAudio Fiction Making Noise: A Changing Genre in Children’s Literature
This article is a study of contemporary audio fiction for children in Sweden, what is sometimes also called audio originals or born-audio books. Audio fiction is defined in the article as literature written to be recorded for audio and consumed through listening. It is a genre related to, and overlapping with, audiobooks, radio, and podcasts but obviously also with literature in printed books. While audio fiction has risen in production and popularity it is not a new phenomenon as such, but rather a kind of literature that has developed over time. The article gives historical examples of children’s audio fiction and situates the contemporary production in a larger context of a changing media world and the book market for children’s literature. The main examples used to understand the phenomenon are IJustWantToBeCool’s Sommarjobbarna (The Summer Workers, 2020–2022) and Camilla Brinck’s series on the mice Musse & Helium (2017–). These are the most popular audiobooks for children in the last years and both series as well as authors are linked to other media such as Youtube, podcast, print, and music. The theoretical conjectures derive from book history and sociology of literature, arguing that changing media for literature has direct implications for literary form, function, and dissemination. Methodologically the article is a genre study using Alastair Fowler’s concept of genre as aggregated features. Thus, a comparison is made between the two examples and other formats such as children’s print books, audiobooks, and radio drama as well as literary genres such as adventure fiction, melodrama, and slapstick. Furthermore, narrative aspects of the two audio literature examples are analyzed in terms of metafiction, voice, and sound effects
Margaretha Ullström, Folkhemsideologi i svensk ungdomslitteratur: En 1900-talsstudie
No full textReview/Recensio
”Sveriges första barnbok med hen”: Normkritik och didaktik i Kivi & Monsterhund
No full text”Sweden’s First Children’s Book with They”: Norm-Criticism and Didactics in Kivi & Monsterhund
Around 2007, several self-proclaimed norm-critical publishing companies were established in Sweden. This caused a long debate in the daily press, where some critics compared the ”norm-critical” books to propaganda. The debate indicates a conflict between an aesthetic and a didactic approach to children’s literature. Another lively debate with similar critique took off when Kivi & Monsterhund (Kivi and Monsterdog, 2012) by Jesper Lundqvist and Bettina Johansson was published – a picturebook where the protagonist is referred to by a gender-neutral prounoun. The purpose of this article is to problematise the prevailing view on self-proclaimed norm-critical children’s literature and its didactic relationship to the reader. The reception, the paratexts, and the book itself are analysed using Torben Weinreich’s and Clémentine Beauvais’ different definitions of didactics, Gérard Genette’s view on pararatexts, Maria Nikolajeva’s theories on picturebooks, and Judith Butler’s view on gender as performative. The book, and its didactic relationship to the reader, is found to be much more complex and conflicting than suggested by the reception and the paratexts.
 
Helene Ehriander & Corina Löwe (red.), Flickboken och flickors läsning: Flickskapande nu och då
No full textReview/Recensio
What Are You Going Through? : Practices of Care, Emotional Literacy and Visual Literacy in Jöns Mellgren’s Sigrid och natten
No full textTheme: Motherhood and Mothering. Ill. ©Stina Wirsén
Jöns Mellgren’s Sigrid och natten (Sigrid and the Night, 2013), is a tale of grief and post-traumatic stress, but also – and more importantly – a tale of care and healing. The article’s aim is to show how the book offers narrative-visual access to social emotions (such as love and grief) and mental states (such as depression), which are usually not yet accessible to a young audience through their own experience. These social emotions and mental states are made tangible in different ways through the multimediality and materiality of the picturebook, and by the particular dialogical reading situation that the picturebook warrants. Picturebooks are consequently understood as part of visual literacy training and, explicitly in this context, of the acquiring of “emotional literacy” (Nikolajeva, “Emotions in Picturebooks” 114). The article argues that Sigrid och natten provides a training ground for visual and, in particular, emotional literacy. Three leitmotifs are examined in Sigrid och natten, namely lighthouses, colors, and hands, and one particular question is used as an analytical tool: “what are you going through?” (Ruddick, “Maternal Thinking” 596). The theme of mothering is connected to the hand and the lighthouse in particular. Regarded in a larger context of practices of care, a form of mothering takes place, for instance, in the reading situation (the reading aloud) of the book by caretakers/readers. The concept of visual literacy is influenced by Walter Benjamin’s theory on picturebooks, while cognitive criticism, reader-response theory, and a material and visual studies approach provide the theoretical framework for the reading of Mellgren’s picturebook
Skräpestetiska möjligheter : Kollage, bricoleurer och miljödebatt i Inger och Lasse Sandbergs 1960-talsbilderböcker
No full textThe Aesthetical Possibilities of Waste: Collage, Bricoleurs, and Environmental Debate in Inger and Lasse Sandberg’s 1960s Picturebooks
This article examines the picturebooks Lilla spöket Laban (The Little Ghost Laban, 1965), Vad lilla Anna sparade på (What Little Anna Saved, 1965), Pojken med de många husen (The Boy with the Many Houses, 1968) and Filurstjärnan (The Filur Star, 1969) by Inger and Lasse Sandberg from a waste-oriented perspective. The theoretical framework originates from waste studies, a growing field of cultural analysis that focuses on trash, decay, and toxic sites. The article argues that the Sandbergs’ works can be read as a critique of life in the Wasteocene, an era marked by waste production, overconsumption, and environmental degradation. During the 1960s and 1970s, Inger and Lasse Sandberg develop a waste aesthetics that challenge the Wasteocene logic by foregrounding leftover pieces and imperfect objects. Firstly, the article presents an analysis of the collage technique in Sandbergs’ works, mainly in Lilla spöket Laban. Secondly, it examines the bricoleur motif in Vad lilla Anna sparade på and Pojken med de många husen. Finally, the environmental theme in Filurstjärnan is explored. The article concludes that Inger and Lasse Sandberg’s picturebooks highlight and transcend the Wasteocene logic in terms of both form and content. The waste aesthetics and environmental motifs challenge the dualistic narrative of the capitalist system by questioning the hierarchical division between commodity and trash, the beautiful and the ugly, the amateur and the professional. The picturebooks can thus be read as counter-narratives advocating an alternative view of value and beauty