Updating Richard Scarry

Florida State University recently led "the most comprehensive study of 20th century children's books ever undertaken in the United States."  They found a gender bias toward male lead characters, even in books about animals — books like those by Richard Scarry.

"The widespread pattern of underrepresentation of females that we find supports the belief that female characters are less important and interesting than male characters.  This may contribute to a sense of unimportance among girls and privilege among boys.  The gender inequalities we found may be particularly powerful because they are reinforced by patterns of male-dominated characters in many other aspects of children's media, including cartoons, G-rated films, video games, and even coloring books."

An article "8 changes that were made to a classic Richard Scarry book to keep up with the times. Progress!," illustrates changes that were made to classic Richard Scarry children's books since 1970 to make them more gender appropriate.

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