Matthew Courtney
In 2019, the Centre for Literacy in Primary Education (CLPE) released their second Reflecting Realities report, which explored ethnic representation within children’s literature published in the UK. In consonance with other studies, the report highlighted the paucity of Black and Minority Ethnic (BAME) characters in children’s literature. Only 7% of books within the study contained a BAME character, in contrast with 33.1% of UK school age children who are ‘of minority ethnic origins’, according to DfE statistics (DfE, 2018). Additionally, only 4% of the books in the study had a BAME main character. (CLPE, 2019).
