Developing critical thinking through a urban legend

Open publication - Free publishing - More education

Do young adults read for pleasure or obligation?

Open publication - Free publishing - More education

Does any piece of science fiction correspond to YAL?

by Jésica Torres

In the last decades, it seems that science fiction has become a popular genre for young adult readers and writers as well. “The Starry Rift”, an anthology of original stories edited by Jonathan Strahan, is a result of this rising market and an attempt to re-invent science fiction for the young adult readers of today. However, I believe that “The dismantle invention of fate”, a fictional short story written by Jeffery Ford, has been mistakenly included within this compilation as I would not consider it a case of young adult literature but as a case of science fiction for elder readers.

It has been psychologically proved that teenagers are interested in reading stories that tie in with their own personal experience and life stage. They want to feel identified with the characters and the situations they are living and to place themselves in the hero’s role and fantasize about it. In the case of the story “The dismantle invention of fate”, the main character is an ancient astronaut who, in spite of telling the adventures he has lived when young, he does it from an adult point of view. This fact may give young readers a sense different time and context. It is known that teenagers are not likely to feel identified with old people’s stories that were lived in another time that it is not the days they are living in.

Another feature that supports the idea that this tale should not be included within young adult literature is the fact that it deals with concepts teenagers are not familiar with. Once again, the age of the protagonist is a key element since he reveals the feelings that arouse in him when remembering his youth. As an adult, he manages concepts and has experienced feelings like loss, nostalgia and fate which may not be meaningful for teenagers as they may not have lived or experienced them yet because of the period of life they are passing through.

In conclusion, I believe that the aspects previously mentioned need to be considered when deciding which texts may be interesting for young adults to read or not. It is not that any piece of fictional literature would be attractive for teens just because of its literary genre. Fictional stories need to be appealing for adolescents and to manage concepts and experiences which young people can feel identified with. Only if the literary text fulfils these requirements, it can be considered as young adult literature, which is not the case of “The dismantle invention of fate”.

Giving the right message?

by Jésica Torres

´When an elephant walks’ intends, as the author says, to show children that everyone gets scared. But is the story message as simple as that? Or it hides more complex matters as regards society and human relationship? Even a strong and big animal like an elephant may be afraid of something. However, I think that the writer goes beyond her original focus and says more than that. The story, in fact, shows how society stigmatizes and judges people because of their appearance and how fear prevents us from being helpful.

It’s widely known that the strongest animals are the ones that survive in the jungle and this conception is somewhat reflected in the story. Big and strong animals fright smaller ones. No matter they are carnivorous or not, their life may be in danger or not, they just get scared because of the big size or the physical appearance of these animals. The bear gets scared when he sees an elephant walking, the crocodile gets scared when he sees the bear running, the racoon gets scared when she sees the wild hot dashing, the mouse gets scared when he sees the racoon running and the elephant, at last, gets scared when he sees the ugly little mouse running away. The story does not encourage children not to feel scared because of other person’s size or appearance; an elephant would never hurt a bear, as a bear wouldn’t be a threat to a crocodile. However, the bear as well as the crocodile get scared when they notice that the other animals are bigger than them. The same happens with the elephant and the mouse; how is it that an elephant gets scared of such a small and insignificant animal? Easy to answer! Mice are so ugly animals that you should be scared of them. Not because they may be dangerous, but because of their repulsive appearance.

How fear works against solidarity is another issue that this story portrays. None of the animals ask the other why they are scared or if they need help. They just run away because they feel frightened. Individualism and not solidarity is then transmitted to children. All the animals run away when they see that the other may be in danger. They don´t care if the other needs help and they don´t even ask the reason of the scaring. They don´t offer their help and no one, of course, helps them. They all want to save themselves without worrying about the others.

We have all once got scared of something, that’s true, but we have to ask ourselves if we are giving children the right message. Do we want children to be afraid of someone because of his/her appearance and not to react generously, or do we want kids to be capable of overcoming their fears and managing difficult situations?

Zamba; a new alternative on TV for Argentinean children

Jésica Torres & Daniela Pugliese

Children spend a great amount of their time in front of the TV screen. A number of TV channels for children offer their program schedules generating a market directed to young consumers. Argentinean children are everyday exposed to consume television from other countries. They watch cartoons and advertisements that show a reality that does not represent our culture, reality and history.

Within this context, an interesting alternative has been created by the Ministry of Education; Channel Paka Paka. This new TV channel, which is not transmitted in some cable servers and therefore, it is not available for all Argentinean children, contains programs which invite young viewers to discover and participate in the children’s world with educational and cultural contents. In this channel we find “Zamba”, a cartoon of four episodes that entertains and educates Argentinean kids within our culture and history. 

One of the principal characteristics of this cartoon, different from those transmitted in Disney Channel or Discovery Kids, is that it is developed in an Argentinean context. For the first time, our children can watch a cartoon in which the main character is a boy from Formosa called José, nicknamed Zamba.  He goes to a state-run school and wears a white overall. At the begging of each episode, he goes into a school trip with his teacher and partners to different parts of Argentina, where he learns about our history. He visits El Museo del Cabildo, Yapeyú, Casa de Tucumán and La casa de Sarmiento.

In fact, the main aim of the cartoon is to show the audience our origins in an entertaining way bringing back national heroes. Zamba travels to the past. He witnesses and takes part of important events of our history such as the May Revolution and the Independence Day. He meets the protagonists and interacts with them. What is more, Zamba’s idol is not one of the “American Heroes” but a national one as San Martin. The boy demonstrates great admiration for him all along the show and at the end of each program, Zamba and San Martin reflect on what they have learned and they clear up doubts, if any. 

Zamba does not only give value to our culture and identity, but also to our national animation and musical production. The characters on the cartoon speak Spanish with an Argentinean accent, the music used is national, like the zamba, chacarera and tango, and they eat autochthonous food, as chipa. The music played on the show is made by Argentinean musicians such as Soledad Pastoruti and Fito Paez. The animation and scripts are also made and written by national illustrators and writers.

Paka Paka and Zamba do not see our children as the targets of consumption marketing; they do not contain advertisements and their major aim is to educate. Children and parents have now another alternative on TV. Even if children spend their time in front of the TV screen, they won’t be consuming foreign product, but educating themselves in the Argentinean culture and history. However, the channel is not available for all Argentinean children yet. Do kids deserve to have a channel in which the producers are breaking the model of stereotypes imposed by foreign cultures? We proudly say they do

The great, big, enormous turnip (review by Jésica Torres)

“The great, big, enormous turnip” tells the story of an old man who plants a little turnip hopping it would grow strong. But his wishing is so huge, that he will need many hands to pull it up. By this retelling, Alexei Tolstoy, leads young readers to involve themselves with the values of cooperation, teamwork and diversity.

The little turnip grows great, big and enormous being impossible for the old man to pull it up by himself. For this reason, he calls for help to the old woman. But as their strength is not enough, he goes on asking for help and joining more people and animals who accept to cooperate with the old man despite the differences they may have as regards culture, age, race and gender. In fact, it is not until they are all together hauling the turnip up at the same time and direction, that the big plant comes up.

Tolstoy’s retelling is great for young learners of the English language. Its repetitive use of the regular and a few irregular verbs in the past tense and the reiteration of lexical items that children are familiar with, make the book and effective resource; easy for children to understand and enjoy while learning collective principles in the foreign language.