The Portrayal of Puerto Ricans in Children’s Literature

Research has focused on patterns and themes under the umbrella term Latino children’s literature. However, the amount of books portraying Puerto Rican characters, settings, and stories is limited, creating a gap in understanding the representations of Puerto Ricans and Puerto Rican-Latino/as in children’s literature. This study explores the voice of Puerto Ricans through a critical content analysis of fifteen picture books published from 2000 to 2013. The first finding reveals images of rural Puerto Rico present in approximately half of the books and balanced with urban images in the remaining titles. The second finding explores how the stories contribute to resisting colonial discourses as they challenge persistent myths affecting the broad Latino population. These texts illustrate the complexity of being Puerto Rican and Latino/a, as well as explore colonial discourses and resistance within the literature.