DIFFERENT DIFFERENTER

A debut illustrated children’s book focuses on starting discussions about skin color and diversity with kids, centering on a South Asian audience.

This work tackles simple questions that school-aged children are likely to ask about others’ physical appearances and attitudes (“Why are our skin colors so different?” “Why are grown-ups sometimes mean to each other?”). In a series of chapters organized around themes (“Seeing Difference,” “Understanding Difference,” “Learning Difference,” “Loving Difference”), Gupta offers an arts-based slate of activities to help parents and educators explore questions that may otherwise be difficult to discuss. Pasricha’s detailed and appealing illustrations in muted colors depict brown-skinned children wearing a variety of clothing styles. The food and cultural references (laddoo sweets; Warli paintings) are Indian. A map shows “the Indian subcontinent” (Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Bhutan are included inside one border) with various activities and Hindu/Mughal cultural sites labeled. The activities included will be useful for many families and classrooms. One activity invites children to find a family member’s skin tone on a page of different-colored fingerprints while another helps kids think about nature’s diversity by collecting and painting leaves. The text prioritizes understanding the natural origins of human diversity and encouraging curiosity about others’ cultures and backgrounds. A role-playing activity featuring a drawing filled with kids with different skin colors, body sizes, and presentations invites youngsters to rehearse how they would ask questions about differences in a good-faith way. Terms like melanin, adaptation, and stereotype are defined for readers. A short history of racism, in South Asia and the world at large, is a bit pat (“One day” oppressed people “fought and defeated the bossy ones”). But lessons throughout encourage readers to dismiss racist stereotypes, and a call to action asks children to intervene in racist incidents.

An engaging primer on embracing differences that deftly combines a narrative with hands-on learning.