Saturday, October 20, 2007

Blindness and Hybrids...?

There was an news "blip" on CNN about an issue that blind people are having today, in the midst of all the new technology. The article discussed the face that the new hybrid cars are so quiet that people who can not see, and depend solely on their hearing to guide them, believe that the extreme quietness that comes with the new environmentally friendly cars could cause a grave problem. I just thought this was interesting to think about while reading the book for this week... I couldn't imagine what it would be like to be in Charlie's situation!
The Lambda Literacy Foundation Award’s website can be found at: http://www.lambdaliterary.org/index.html. The purpose of this award is to celebrate GLBTQ literature. This award does not take the orientation of the author into consideration; it is secondary to the quality of the writing and the LBGTQ content of the work. There are twenty one categories in which books can be nominated by their author or publisher. The books are judged by various members of the literary community, but judges are not announced until the winners are made public.
In 2004, there was a book (The Man Who Would Be Queen) which was nominated, announced as a finalist, and then removed from the list due to an outcry of the LGBTQ population. More information about this at
http://www.tsroadmap.com/info/lambda-literary.html.
We found it quite interesting that we could not find a “seal” to acknowledge books which won this award. Our group questioned whether this is due to the political climate of our country and the connotations that this award might have toward these books. Does not having an award allow for this book to be read by children and young adults without being "flagged"?
In searching for books which have won this award, we could only find two of the books in the young adult/children’s lit categories: Luna (which was found at the library) and Boy Meets Boy (which is actually a book we’re reading in class).