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This study aims at building
an inventory of heroes and heroines coming from the francophone
children’s literature published recently during one year,
up-dating impressive quantitative differences between the central
main characters of both sexes. Male central characters systematically
outnumber female central characters, however, the nature and
age of these characters, and also authors’ sex and children’s
ages targeted by those books qualify the disparities observed.
The biggest asymmetries were obtained with humanized animal
characters, and with human adults. Books that are written for
young children contain the most asymmetries; and disparities
between male and female central roles are primarily written
by male authors. Results obtained from this study are comparable
with those coming from the recent Anglo-Saxon children’s
literature. The discussion concentrates on the multiple consequences
arising from the under representation of the female main characters,
as well as the lower value attributed to them. |
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