Reasons for the research on The construction of the sense of espace vécu in European children’s literature in the second half of the 20th century (1945-2010). An international historical and comparative survey on picturebooks: goals, method, tools, and preliminary results

Abstract

This article seeks to present the goals, methods, tools and preliminary results of the research project The construction of the sense of espace vécu in the European Children's literature in the second half of the 20th century (1945-2010). An international historical and comparative survey on picturebooks. The research focused on an international historical-comparative investigation into how domestic spaces and the espace vécu has evolved in children’s literature since 1945. The project is supported by a research network that includes several scholars of children’s literature from a variety of European countries. From the methodological point of view, this study seeks to examine how a combination of historical and comparative methods can be applied to research in the field of children’s literature. Two research tools have been used: a Word Picturebook Datasheet and an Excel Data Matrix comprising four different tables. The project generated some interesting and thought-provoking comparative results in addition to raising some issues with regard to the tools used to collect the data.