Campaign to stamp out 'books for boys,' 'books for girls' gains traction
A UK campaign to take such phrases as 鈥渇or boys鈥� and 鈥渇or girls鈥� off children鈥檚 books has garnered thousands of signatures for its petition and has seen writers and a newspaper advocating for the change.
The campaign is titled Let Books Be Books and is related to the Let Toys Be Toys campaign, in which supporters advocate that toys be marketed to all children rather than one gender or the other.
The Let Books Be Books petition on , which asks publishers to take off 鈥渇or girls鈥� or 鈥渇or boys鈥� phrasing from regular books as well as activity and sticker books, has received more than 4,000 signatures.
鈥淗ow can a story or a colouring page be only for a girl or only for a boy?鈥� the petition reads. 鈥淎 good book should be open to anyone, and children should feel free to choose books that interest them.鈥�
UK Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, UK children鈥檚 laureate Marjorie Blackman, and 鈥淗is Dark Materials鈥� author Philip Pullman, among other writers, have said they support the initiative, according to the , while the bookseller Waterstones has said the company 鈥淸doesn鈥檛] buy gender-specific books centrally鈥� and they consider 鈥済ender-specific displays 鈥� a definite 'no'.鈥�
Publishers Parragon and Usborne have said they will no longer release books with such titles.
In addition, the literary editor for the UK newspaper , Katy Guest, has said she will not review books that have such designations and that they will not be covered on the newspaper鈥檚 book blog.
鈥淚f you are a publisher with enough faith in your new book that you think it will appeal to all children, we鈥檒l be very happy to hear from you,鈥� she wrote. 鈥淏ut the next Harry Potter or Katniss Everdeen will not come in glittery pink covers. So we鈥檇 thank you not to send us such books at all.鈥�
