This is a lovely picture book about a young African-American girl asking questions, and learning about color differences and other differences within the African-American community. Tai asks about the range of skin colors, and why they're all described as "brown." Along the way, she also learns about cultural differences, and some African-Americans prefer to identify one way, and some another, and the history of where different groups come from. And, of course, different degrees of race mixing in the history of African-Americans in America.
Some will feel that this last part is dealt with a bit too gently, and I certainly can't say they're wrong. However, the point of this book is teaching young children just old enough to be asking these questions for the first time to learn pride in their heritage and who they are, so I'm not prepared to say the author is wrong either. It's a warm, gentle, kind book, about accepting yourself and others, and taking pride in who you are.
I received a free electronic galley of this book from the author.
No comments:
Post a Comment