Overall, I think it is still quite difficult to define "Australian" identity. What may encapsulate a sense of belonging to one person, may not be the case for others. It seems even more difficult to find any kind of academic work related to children in the early childhood bracket (0-7/8 year olds) and their views on what "Australian" identity is. One of the papers investigated in a previous blog entry (Purdie and Wilss 2007) highlights that very little work has been done so far on researching how children understand or interpret "Australian" identity.
Australian beaches (Bondi, Sydney is pictured above) are another popular image representing "Australia". Source of image - http://www.lastbeach.com/australia/australian-beaches-tips-hints-and-surfing-bondi-style/
Yet, as highlighted by the book review from Galda and Tobin (1992) there is a lot of reading material aimed at the younger age bracket that contains stereotypical images of what it means to be "Australian".
Overall, the initial literature review into understanding "Australian" idenitty has revealed a few themes, best described by the research of Purdie and Wilss (2007) and described on this previous post.
Although these themes come from adolescents, rather than small children, they will form the basis of the next section of this project, which will look at whether these representations of "Australian" identity are present in the three shows chosen from the ABC website - (Banana's in Pyjuama's, dirtgirlworld and The Koala Brothers).
Another issue to consider has come up through an article by Howard (1994) which explores issues around 'reality'. Whether children for example, perceive the "Banana's in Pyjama's" to be real or not. Which brings me back to my premise about Gee's "big D" discourse. If the children who watch these television shows are still grappling with the concept of reality, then isn't it possible that these children could be engaging with these characters in the character's own make believe world? And if so, what does this mean as far as literacy is concerned?
Image of children watching television from an American website titled "The Parents Zone" which provides advice to parents on how to manage their children's television watching habits. The emphaise is that too much television is bad for your child.
The other interesting thing I have come across so far, has included the negative emphasis on television in regards to early childhood education. Searches on metalib across databases - using the term 'early childhood" and 'television' has a tendency to bring up negative issues like - early childhood and television and obesity. There seems to be an automatic assumption that television is bad for children. Yet, television is often the first major media interaction young children have and many of the characters from television, like Banana's in Pyjama's, dirtgirl and The Koala Brothers have their own accompanying websites with intereactive games etc. Therefore, the characters themselves often have a cross platform multimedia persona.
So I am somewhat confused by the separation of televisoin (bad) from other media forms (e.g. computers) which are seen to have a somewhat higher educational value? I could just be imagining this though and this line of thought is unfortunately outside the scope of this project. But worth mentioning.
I don't want to edit too much of my blogs 'in retrospect', but would like to add one crucial point that I think is missing from the above opening statement and that is how I came to want to look into these issues. My thoughts were originally triggered by the "Australian Children's Television Foundation Submission to the Children's Television Standards Review, 28 (2007)" - which made a very strong case for local content for pre-schooler's, based on what appeared to be an assumption that local content taught children about their national identity. I think this whole project is about teasing that out a bit and trying to understand what it means.
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