Supergirl’s Adoption Lens: Swooping Past Stereotypes

April 14, 2016 Most know Superman and Supergirl are adopted, along with Peter Parker as Spiderman, Dick Grayson as Robin, and heck even Bamm Bamm Rubble from the Flintstones...but all too often in media, characters depicted as adopted get the ‘cartoon’ treatment even when they’re not cartoons. From language used in journalism coverage, to controversial  Avengers punchlines in … [Read more...]

I Am Elemental: Superheroes Strike A Pitch Perfect Toy Tenor

May 11, 2015 With superheroes crushing box office numbers with Hulk style force and toy merchandisers frantically scrambling to address market demand for sheroes deleted from mass media like an invisibly evil comic book spell, hashtags like #IncludeTheGirls are trumpeting a Herculean reminder that the new era of girls dubbed “Generation K” for Katniss will NOT be dissed and … [Read more...]

Selling Reluctant Readers: 10 Marketing Tactics To Amp Up Fun

Feb. 14, 2017 Valentine's Day Update: More ways to encourage reading, with therapy dogs (via MindshiftKQED Learning)  and a few "Kidlit" picks for Valentine's Day that streamed across my desk, here and here...Off to my new tutoring gig at Reading Partners.org!  Jan. 16, 2017 MLK Weekend: Book Three of March is out with Andrew Aydin, Nate Powell and John Lewis' much needed … [Read more...]

The Perfect Gift for a Man: Reinventing Manhood (Book)

Dec. 9, 2009 And now for the GOOD news! Yesterday for I wrote about ‘boys being turned into monsters’ with toxic marketing proliferation about what it means to be masculine, rolling out narrowcast perceptions and gender roles thinner than a crepe. Today, meet 30 men who donated their stories, time and talent to author The Perfect Gift for a Man: 30 stories about reinventing … [Read more...]

Halloween Beyond the Cliché: Packaging Boyhood Part Two

Oct. 7, 2014 Update I realize I've been 'deconstructing' Halloween for years with pushback on the societal sexploitation of girls as we fiercely try to "Take Back Halloween" by mythbusting "market demand"...But the little boys' lens of how some of the girls costumes land on them is one to watch too, instilling critical thinking early on...in this case, two posts by SheKnows.com … [Read more...]