En värld full av möjligheter eller en redogörelse för hans och hennes? – en studie om hur genus framställs i förskolors bilderböcker

The purpose of this study was to examine gender depiction in picture books in preschools. Our experience is that many picture books contain old-fashioned gender stereotypes. During the analysing process, we used the following theories: Yvonne Hirdman’s theory about the stereotypic gender contract and Lev Vygotskij’s theory about experiences increasing our ability to fantasize. We read through 154 picture books in two preschools and categorized them into two categories: normative and non-normative books. Later we chose ten of these books for further analysis. Furthermore, we interviewed five preschool teachers about their views and experiences in the subject, gender in children’s picture books. We used a qualitative method when analysing both the picture books and the interviews. Noticeably, none of the ten books we analysed thoroughly were completely normative or completely non-normative; they all contained more or less content from each category. Despite this, most of the 154 books were more normative than not. Also, all of the preschool teachers said in the interviews that they thought it important in what way gender is depicted in the book collection they have in the preschool. However, most of them also said that they don’t think that the books have much influence over children’s apprehension of gender. The preschool teachers also described different ways in which they made compensations for the normativity in the books