Interrogating the Lack of Diversity in Award-Winning LGBTQ-Inclusive Picturebooks

ABSTRACT

This article presents the results of a thorough content analysis of 28 LGBTQ award-winning picturebooks. As a queer teacher educator working with pre-service elementary teachers, I wanted to find out how the queer picturebooks available for use in my students’ classrooms were any good at helping them and their future students understand that ’diversity’ and multicultural literature include LGBTQ people. What I found was enlightening and disheartening – offering both affordances and constraints for the elementary classroom. Through my analyses, I uncovered several aspects regarding race, gender identity, specific sexual orientations, and LGBTQ-inclusive language either present or lacking in the study text set. This study identifies aspects of quality LGBTQ-inclusive collections without ignoring the limitations of the materials and messages currently available to teachers.