Welcome
Books written for children are among the best loved and best remembered of all works of literature. They also provide some of the most important early learning experiences. In recent years, literature written for children has attracted increasing interest from scholars and students as well as parents, educators, publishers, and journalists. What kinds of stories do we consider appropriate for children, and why? How have our opinions about this topic changed over time and across different cultures? And how is literacy changing, now that children are exposed not only to books, films, and television, but also to video games and the world wide web?
The interdisciplinary Certificate in Children’s Literature offers undergraduates the opportunity to bring together studies across a broad range of subjects as they contemplate these and other questions pertaining to children’s literature and the history of childhood and adolescence. Founded in 1981, the program is designed to meet the individual student’s interests and strengths and fulfills the Arts and Sciences requirement for a related area. It provides a useful background for many areas of professional work and study, including graduate school in the humanities (English, History, Art History, Film Studies) or social sciences (Sociology, Psychology, Anthropology), as well as careers in library or information science, child care, social work, creative writing and illustration, publishing, and bookselling. And of course, many of the students who earn this Certificate go on to careers in elementary, secondary, and special education.
