Outside Child In and Out of the Book

<p><em>The Outside Child, In and Out of the Book</em> is situated at the intersection between children’s literature studies and childhood studies. In this provocative book, Christine Wilkie-Stibbs juxtaposes the narratives of literary and actual children/young adults to explore how Western culture has imagined, defined, and dealt with their outsider status – whether orphaned, homeless, refugee, victims of abuse, or exploited – and how processes of economic, social, or political impoverishment are sustained and naturalized in regimes of power, authority, and domination. </p><p>In five chapters titled: "Outsider," "Displaced," "Erased," "Abject," "Unattached," and "Colonized," the book situates and repositions a range of pre- and post-millennium children’s/young adult fictions, autobiographies, policy documents, and reports in the current climate of rabid globalization, new "out-group" definitions, and prescribed normativity. Children’s/young adult fictions considered include: Malorie Blackman’s <em>Noughts and Crosses </em>trilogy; Mark Haddon’s <em>The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time; </em>Jacqueline Wilson’s <em>The Illustrated Mum</em>; Shyam Selvadurai’s <em>Funny Boy</em>; Ann Provoost’s <em>Falling; </em>Meg Rosoff’s,<em> How I Live Now</em>; Elizabeth Laird’s <em>A Little Piece of Ground</em>. Autobiographical works include Zlata Filipovic’s <em>Zlata’s Diary</em>; Kevin Lewis’s <em>The Kid;</em> Latifa’s <em>My Forbidden Face;</em> and Valérie Zenatti’s <em>When I Was a Soldier</em>.</p> <p>1. Outsider 2. Displaced 3. Erased 4. Abject 5. Unattached 6. Colonized </p>