Disability representation and children’s literature: the supercrip rhetoric

Abstract

The essay aim is to highlight the specific language of children’s literature and how this influence the disability portraits outlined in the books for young readers. There is a close correlation between representations, collective imaginary and identity building and this is even more true in the children’s literature field. For this reason, it is socially and pedagogically relevant to analyze which rhetoric are implicitly transmitted to children. This contribution resumes Giuseppe Vadalà study on the most common rhetoric in disability representation and applies it to deepen, specifically, the supercrip portraits traceable in Italian children’s literature with a historical perspective. The investigation shows that supercrip characters are very frequent today as in the past and suggests that these representations, inauthentic and far from reality, contribute to the maintain of the disability social exclusion dynamic.