Identifying Cultural Authenticity within New Zealand Children’s Literature

Abstract

Research Problem: Within the United States there is a large body of work detailing the importance of cultural authenticity in children’s literature for non white children and how to identify it but no similar work has been attempted in New Zealand. This study aimed to determine whether or not this research could be applied to a New Zealand Māori context.

Methodology: An analysis of six frameworks from the United States was undertaken in order to identify what each researcher felt was the most important aspects of cultural authenticity within a text. These points were then used to create a new framework which was applied to a small group of New Zealand picture books to see if the framework would work in a New Zealand context.

Results: The study showed that both the United States and New Zealand have similar issues when it comes to supplying non white children with texts which reflect their own culture. It also showed that the framework developed is capable of helping librarians identify aspects of Māori cultural authenticity.

Implications: The research shows that if libraries are concerned about the amount of books they have that feature authentic Māori characters then a framework like this would be useful for selection purposes.