Australian Children's Literature is an important aspect of AustLit's work in recording Australian literary history.
Over the past decade, a range of information about book and archival collections has been collected, thousands of rich biographical and bibliographical records about authors and works created, a major digitisation project has developed a fascinating full text collection of early children's books, and specialist research projects have been supported, including the creation of a range of information trails exploring themes, preoccupations, and the way Australian history is embedded in texts for children.
The Lu Rees Archives (@LuReesArchives), which is supported by the University of Canberra and the Children's Book Council of Australia, has provided a rich collection of data under the direction of Professor Belle Alderman.
Deakin University Library and the School of Communication and Creative Arts at Deakin generously contributed to the further development of AustLit's record of Australian Children's Literature publishing and promotion through the creation of datasets relating to school magazines and readers.
In 2008, Queensland University of Technology joined AustLit. Together with Deakin University, they initiated the Children's Literature Digital Resources (CLDR) project to investigate and establish an appropriate digitisation program to deliver a range of primary and secondary texts to the Australian literature teaching and research communities.
Australian Children's Literature Projects include:
Australian Children's Literature includes records of works of fiction, poetry and drama written for children and young adults by Australian authors. It includes reviews of these works, information about their authors, information about organisations involved in the creation and publication of Australian children's literature and critical articles on Australian children's literature. It does not include writing about childhood for adult audiences: these records can be discovered through subject searches of the AustLit dataset.