Getting Rid of Children's Literature

Abstract

"Children's Literature" is a troublesome term. Jones proposes to get rid of it, but not losing sight of children and child readers in doing so. She recommends a new term, "Child Literature," as a way to think through many critical difficulties while sustaining the genre and its critical discourse. Jones broadly explores critical approaches to the genre and links between feminist and child literature criticism. She examines how literary critics might ground critical positions they take in light of poststructuralist skepticism about foundational arguments and what critical approaches to child literature might bring to broader cultural theory.