In A Family of Readers by Roger Sutton and Martha V. Parravano, they discuss the differences between “Girl” and “Boy” books. They even give a list called “MORE GREAT GIRL BOOKS” and “MORE GREAT BOY BOOKS”.
After looking over the lists, I saw a few books and author’s that caught my eye:
Meg Cabot was on the girls list, and I remember reading many of her “girl” books when I was young. I think of her as a “girl” author, even though I don’t know if she writes “boy” books.
An interesting book on the “Boy” list was Jeff Kinney’s, Diary of a Wimpy Kid. When I was volunteering in a third grade classroom, I remember many boys and girls loved the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. In fact, I even remember more girls than boys saying they loved this series!
This is interesting to me because the authors of this textbook somehow believe that this series belongs in the “Boy” list. I personally have never read any of these books, but maybe it is the masculinity, sports, or “man” like behaviors portrayed in the book. I do not know, but I think the fact that many books can be classified into “Boy” or “Girl” books leads to ideas about gender stereotypes. Maybe there are girls who love reading about sports and boys who enjoy reading about love. Either, way my experience with third grade boys and girls who both loved the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series, shows me that all of these “Boy” and “girl” lists are not necessarily true.
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