Library Offers Alternative Tales
From the collection of
From the collection of
Stevenage Library finds a receptive audience for children's books which take a fresh approach to gender roles.
Hertfordshire libraries are actively seeking to avoid stereotyping in the books offered for children's reading and promote works which play down traditional gender roles. A boy interviewed at a story session finds the characters in the alternative tales true to life and it looks like the children are ready to accept different role models, such as girls who want careers and boys who show their emotions.The library staff are aware this might appear too radical and seek to justify their concern about balance in representation while being a bit wary of wider public opinion. Librarian Ann Henderson is interviewed, and introduces the children to Babette Cole's picture book, Princess Smartypants. A talk and exhibition about non-sexist books for children will be held at Stevenage Central Library in Hertfordshire to coincide with Stevenage Borough Council's 'Her' Week.The reporter was Owen Spencer-Thomas for this video made to be shown in a news story on Anglia Television's early evening news / magazine programme About Anglia.
Video filmed to be inserted during live broadcast of Anglia Television's early evening news / magazine programme About Anglia. The live studio presentation provided context for the video as part of a news story or magazine feature within the programme. About Anglia was not recorded during broadcast, so it is usually just the pre-recorded programme inserts which survive. In the 1980s Anglia Television was broadcasting to a wide area in the East of England including Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Essex, Norfolk, Northamptonshire, Suffolk and adjoining parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire and Rutland where there was some overlap with neighbouring ITV regions.