My thoughts, to my professor

My thoughts, without theory and quotes, on my proposed project:
Which I have to comment is hard to do, as right now I keep thinking of Chiamanda Adichie's TED talk about the danger of single stories and how that really speaks to my experience of stories. As I have read many children's books about White people from different countries and times, I have never questioned the dominance of these books. In fact, each character in a book that I've identified with seems unique and individual rather than creating a dominating "single picture" of the world. I also read a lot of children's books about people who are more radically different than me. I've always believed that reading books is a way to create intimate connections with people who are different than you in a way that encourages understanding and acknowledgment as also human. One of the questions that I've shared with many lovers of multicultural fiction (and even non-fiction) is how can you judge issues of representation? As an outsider to many to these cultures, I'm far from an expert, but as a scholar of children's literature I am still expected to have authoritative opinions which I am expected to express. The one thing I've never been able to do with children's literature before is attempt to read it from the perspective of a non-dominant ethnicity, if that makes any sense. I'm also interesting in trying to find ways to talk about multiculturalism in children's literature with my students that focus on creating openings for thought and ideally eventual change. I've tried to do this with my class so far over the quarter, such as bringing attention to the fact that when we read Love That Dog by Sharon Creech no one mentioned or questioned that Mr. Walter Dean Myers is an African American featured in a white woman's book. They may not have known and I don't even know what the significance of what this fact is except that we don't think about it and we don't talk about it and that we assume Jack and Ms. Stretchberry are white, we can't take Mr. Walter Dean Myers's physical appearance and culture away from him even if Creech doesn't say a word about what any human in her book looks like. In fact, his poem which the book features is very.. ethnicized? enculturated? It sounds African American- I can literally hear the deep resonance of an African American voice in the words. But is that my perception because I know what he looks like, or is it even there? I also feel somewhat overwhelmed by not knowing the words to talk about these things and desperately wanting to try anyway, but hoping that I won't offend anyone as I explore.