Like many academics, I love books. Like many book-loving parents, I’m keen to share that love with my young children. Two years ago, I chanced upon two different professors in children’s books, in quick succession. Wouldn’t it be a fun project, I thought, to see how academics, and universities, appear in children’s illustrated books? This would function both as an excuse to buy more books (we do live in a golden age of second hand books, cheaply delivered to your front door) and to explain to my kids – now five and a half, and twins of three – what Mummy Actually Does.
It turns out it’s hard to search just for children’s books, and picture books, in library catalogues, but I combed through various electronic library resources, as well as Amazon, eBay, LibraryThing, and Abe, to dig up source material. I began to obsessively search the bookshelves of kids books in friend’s houses, and doctors and dentist and hospital waiting rooms, whilst also keeping on the look out on our regular visits to our local library: often academics appear in books without being named in the title, so dont turn up easily via electronic searches. Parking my finds on a devoted Tumblr which was shared on social media, friends, family members, and total strangers tweeted, facebooked, and emailed me to suggest additions. People sidled up to me after invited guest lectures to whisper “I have a good professor for you…” Two years on, I’ve no doubt still not found all of the possible candidates, but new finds in my source material are becoming less frequent. 101 books (or individual books from a series*) and 108 academics, and a few specific mentions of university architecture and systems later, its time to look at what results from a survey of the representation of academics and academia in children’s picture books.