Arabic children's literature: Glitzy production, disciplinary content

Hanada Taha Thomure
Zayed University, United Arab Emirates
Shereen Kreidieh
Asala Publishers, Lebanon
Sandra Baroudi
Zayed University, United Arab Emirates

Children's literature in the Arabic language has seen an impressive boom in the last decade both in quantity and quality. Arabic children's literature awards have also increased in number and competitiveness. However, children's literature in the Arabic language continues to be criticised for not being appealing to children, due to its didactic content and its highly symbolic language. This study analysed 47 award-winning Arabic children's literature books, looking at five domains. The purpose was to look for features and trends common to award-winning books. Results revealed that Arabic children' literature continues to be seen as a tool to educate and impart morality. Results also revealed the dominance of male characters, the prevalence of realistic fiction genres, and the repeated use of poverty, child displacement, family and refugees as the topics of choice when writing for children.
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Authors: Hanada Taha Thomure has worked in the field of Arabic language education for 27 years and is now the Endowed Professor of Arabic Language at Zayed University, United Arab Emirates. She has published several books on the teaching of Arabic language and on children's literature. She authored the first Arabic text age levelling system, now used by more than 100 children's literature publishers. She has served as a judge for the Etisalat book award. Email: hanada.thomure@zu.ac.ae Web:https://www.zu.ac.ae/main/en/colleges/colleges/__college_of_education/faculty_and_staff/_profiles/Hanada_Thomure.aspx Dr Shereen Kreidieh established Asala Publishers, a producer of high quality children's books in Arabic. She is the president of Lebanese Board of Books for Young Children. She was a member of the Hans Christian Anderson Award Jury for 2018. She teaches children's literature and social work courses in Haigazian University in Beirut, Lebanon. Email: asala_publishers@yahoo.com Web: https://asalapublishers.com/?lang=en Sandra Baroudi holds a PhD in educational leadership and management from the British University in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. She has more than four years' experience as a researcher at Zayed University in Dubai. Her research interests include curriculum reform, educational leadership, educational policy and management, and technology in education. Email: baroudi.sandra@gmail.com Please cite as: Taha Thomure, H., Kreidieh, S. & Baroudi, S. (2020). Arabic children's literature: Glitzy production, disciplinary content. Issues in Educational Research, 30(1), 323-344. http://www.iier.org.au/iier30/taha-thomure.pdf