The children´s book : “a genre among others?”

The purpose of this bachelor thesis is to gain insight into the attitudes of children´slibrarian towards the position of the printed Children’s book in today’s medialandscape. The reason for our interest is our belief that librarian’s attitudes to newmedia and their work practice have an effect on how children perceive books andreading. The study is built on qualitative interviews among four children’s librarians.Our theoretical framework stems from a variety of researchers within the fields ofpedagogy and media studies such as David Buckingham, Sonia Livingstone, NeilPostman, Ylva Ellneby and Margaret Mackey. We use their theories to analyse andinterpret results from the interviews. This study reveals a considerable consensus thatthe printed children’s book is considered to be of importance as a means for learningto read and to develop the imagination. The most important conclusion that can bedrawn from the study is that new media is a stronger competitor to the printed bookparticularly in socio-economic poorer areas, and because of this, it is of greaterimportance for librarians to be aware of children’s media worlds in these areas.Program: Bibliotekari