ABSTRACT
Encyclopedias are usually designed to assemble and to encompass, for the purposes of recognition and study, as much of what is known about a subject of interest and concern as the conditions of its production and publication allow. If children’s literature begets new critical theory and moves further into the academic circle it will become subject to institutional conventions and regulations which are not those of the old protectionist ethos. Changes in the ways children learn and are taught to read indicate other symbiotic evaluations in children’s literature. It has a continuous and influential history which is regularly raided for evidence of other social, intellectual and artistic changes. Academic research in children’s literature is still a novelty if it is not psychological, historical or bibliographical – that is, detailed, factual, esoteric, fitting into the research traditions of diverse disciplines, especially those which establish their history, closed to those unschooled in the foundation exercises of the disciplines of dating.
