CFP - Special Issue of interjuli: Old Age and Death in Children’s Literature

Call for Papers: Old Age and Death in Children’s Literature

In children’s literature, elderly people such as Stian Hole’s “Stamp Man” in Garmann’s Street often offer identificatory potential for the young reader since, similar to children, they can escape societal restraints and expectations. At the same time, these figures have increasingly provided the background to discussions about concepts of aging and death in recent years – whether representing avoidance strategies such as in Hermann Schulz and Tobias Krejtschi’s Mama Sambona or gentle pedagogical approaches to grief work such as Ulf Nilsson and Eva Erikssion’s All the Dear Little Animals. How does the discussion of this topic in children’s literature reflect a social change in the treatment of transience? Which linguistic and artistic possibilities are used in this context? How close to reality is children’s literature in its treatment of old age and death?

interjuli 01/13 deals with the focal topic of Old Age and Death. Possible topics are:

• Old people as blueprints for identification and projection of children’s existence
• Dying and death of child protagonists
• Senile dementia and old-age diseases in children’s literature
• Historical development of children’s media’s approaches to old age and death
• Transcendence and religiousness in children’s literature about old age and death
• Children’s literature and grief work
• Children’s literature about old age and death mirroring societal strategies of avoidance and convergence

As always, we also encourage contributions that do not pertain to our focal topic. Please send in your manuscripts by September 15th, 2012. Guidelines concerning formatting and editing standards will be sent out upon request (info@interjuli.de) and can be found at www.interjuli.de.

interjuli is an interdisciplinary scientific journal dedicated to the research into literature for children and young adults. We publish research papers as well as reviews of primary and secondary works.