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Can I Touch Your Hair? Poems of Race, Mistakes, and Friendship
How can Irene and Charles work together on their fifth grade poetry project? They don't know each other . . . and they're not sure they want to.
Irene Latham, who is white, and Charles Waters, who is black, use this fictional setup to delve into different experiences of race in a relatable way, exploring such topics as hair, hobbies, and family dinners. Accompanied by artwork from acclaimed illustrators Sean Qualls and Selina Alko, this remarkable collaboration invites readers of all ages to join the dialogue by putting their own words to their experiences.
Irene Latham, who is white, and Charles Waters, who is black, use this fictional setup to delve into different experiences of race in a relatable way, exploring such topics as hair, hobbies, and family dinners. Accompanied by artwork from acclaimed illustrators Sean Qualls and Selina Alko, this remarkable collaboration invites readers of all ages to join the dialogue by putting their own words to their experiences.
40 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2018
40 people are currently reading
1428 people want to read
About the author
Irene Latham
36 books145 followersIrene Latham is a poet and novelist who was born the middle child and first daughter of five kids.
Irene has lived all sorts of places and traveled worldwide. Since 1984 she has called Birmingham, Alabama, home.
She thinks growing up with three brothers was great preparation for raising her three sons. She also thinks getting a sister was one of the best things that has ever happened to her.
Irene is proud to be the only leftie in her family of origin AND in her current family.
According to Irene's Dr. Seuss' MY BOOK ABOUT ME, she has wanted to be writer since she was eight years old.
She also wanted to train a horse that her sister would ride to victory in the Kentucky Derby. That hasn't happened. Yet.
Irene didn't take a single writing course in college.
Irene has lived all sorts of places and traveled worldwide. Since 1984 she has called Birmingham, Alabama, home.
She thinks growing up with three brothers was great preparation for raising her three sons. She also thinks getting a sister was one of the best things that has ever happened to her.
Irene is proud to be the only leftie in her family of origin AND in her current family.
According to Irene's Dr. Seuss' MY BOOK ABOUT ME, she has wanted to be writer since she was eight years old.
She also wanted to train a horse that her sister would ride to victory in the Kentucky Derby. That hasn't happened. Yet.
Irene didn't take a single writing course in college.
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February 21, 2018
For a long time, maybe as long as children’s books have been published in America, there has been an unspoken understanding amongst white parents that when it comes to race, the less said to children the better. White people are particularly attached to the notion that if you don’t mention race, don’t speak its name, don’t bring it up in any way with kids, then they’ll never notice race on their own and they’ll grow up to become wholly unprejudiced individuals, incapable of even a single racist thought. Right. This belief persists, flying in the face of studies that have shown that kids aren’t blind. One of the very first things they perceive growing up is difference. And if you don’t offer guidance of any sort to them as they age, then you’re allowing the world with all its messages and lessons to do the teaching for you. So children’s books find themselves at a crossroads. They can either continue as they have in the past, trading in specifics for hazy “we’re all the same inside” messages, or they can trod a new path. They can actually try their hand at confronting race head on in a format for the young. It took four people to bring us Can I Touch Your Hair? and countless others to bring it to our library and bookstore shelves. It takes only one person to buy it and show it to a kid. And it takes only one to use it as the conversation starter we’ve needed for so long.
Pick a partner, says the teacher. Sounds so easy, but when Irene (who is white) ends up paired with Charles (who is black) she has no idea what to feel, except nervous. Irene’s quiet and Charles can talk a mile a minute. This is supposed to be a poetry assignment so the kids decide to pick topics they can both write about. You know. Shoes, hair, school, church, that kind of stuff. And at first their poems just reflect their differences. But as time goes on they see that they have so much more in common than they initially suspected. Lots of things are still unknown to them. “Sometimes we say the wrong thing, sometimes we misunderstand. Now we listen, we ask questions.” Because you can’t know what you don’t know until you dig down deep.
As I mentioned, the book was created by four people. Two wrote the words and two did the art. The Authors’ Note in the back of the book tells how Irene asked Charles to be a “writing partner in a conversation about race” initially and how the book bloomed from there. There’s an Illustrators’ Note at the back as well, talking about how the book should “ignite conversations about race and identity.” You’ve heard the old phrase about too many cooks in the kitchen, but in this case everyone involved appears to have had a role to play. This naturally led me to wonder if Irene and Selina wrote and illustrated the character of Irene while Charles and Sean separately tackled Charles the boy. I don’t think that’s how it played out in the end, but I can’t find any interviews here or online that clarify their process. I think in this case I’ll take a cue from something that does appear in the Illustrators’ Note where Sean and Selina waxed poetic over how, “Mixing together materials mirrors our philosophy of mixing together our cultures.” Like any picture book, this one is words and pictures mixed together into a single cohesive whole. It's art. Mixing is what you have to do.
One challenge the authors faced with this book came in the creation of the characters of Irene and Charles. It’s so interesting that they decided to name the kids in the book after themselves. I wonder if it gave them, as writers, a connection to the material they couldn’t have found otherwise. Certainly, for all that the book is written in verse, there is a depth to the kids and their lives you wouldn’t necessarily expect from poetry. Take Irene. She has a pretty good family, but even her dad is prone to outbursts of anger from time to time. Charles, for his part, is wrestling with complex issues he feels ill-equipped to handle. If cops hurt people that look like him, how does that gel with his understanding of one particular cop that he likes? I like that this book is perfectly willing to raise difficult questions without feeling a need to offer up some kind of easy answers. Sometimes a question has to remain a question to do its job right.
Speaking of questions, you might legitimately ask about the book whether or not it quite lives up to its title. I think we can all agree that it’s one of the best titles of a work of poetry that we’ve seen in years. I was reminded of adult books like Phoebe Robinson’s You Can’t Touch My Hair: And Other Things I Still Have to Explain. So is this a version of Robinson’s book, just siphoned down to something appropriate for the elementary school set? Not exactly, but it is attempting to speak to the same underlying issues. Heck, if this book can prevent just one white kid from asking a black kid, “Can I touch your hair?” it may be worth the cover price alone.
I admire this book deeply not least because there were a couple moments that made me, a grown woman, stop and think. One moment came when Irene saw the black girls playing freeze dance and wanted to join in. After a while one of the girls comes up to Irene and says, “You’ve got the whole rest of the playground . . . Can’t we at least have this corner?” It put me in a mind to recollect a book by Beverly Daniel Tatum called Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?: And Other Conversations About Race. The thing that’s interesting to me about the line as it's written is that the girl (Shonda) says “at least”. She and her friends are making a space for themselves and who can blame them if they don’t want Irene barging in? The book makes Irene the sympathetic one in the scene, but I think there’s room here for a discussion with kids about whether or not Shonda and her friends are wrong to want a place where they don’t have to be “on”. Later Irene and Shonda make up (and I’m not sure I buy how that comes about) but that early interaction stands out for me.
For a long time the idea of writing a book about “diversity” was an exercise in being maudlin. Let me describe an average picture book for you. There is a kid. They are prejudiced in some way. Then with the help of a bunch of friends of different races, religions and/or abilities they are able to see that “we’re all the same under our skin”. You’ve seen this book. You’ve probably seen loads of them, with some slight variations one way or another. What’s interesting to me is that books of this sort find safety in being vague on specifics. I’m a child of the 80s and I grew up with these books, so I saw them all the time. You know what I didn’t see? I never saw a single solitary book that took this message but applied it to black and white kids with the aim of showing the problems, the real problems, that kids are facing. I’m not saying these books don’t exist. They’re out there if you look for them (like the harrowing Whitewash by Ntozake Shange, for example). But a book like that, or like Can I Touch Your Hair? is a drop in the ocean when compared to the countless titles that want to promote difference without ever being different themselves. Given the chance, I suggest you try something a little bit different. Try this book. Just be prepared to answer some hard and necessary questions from kids along the way.
For ages 6 and up.
Pick a partner, says the teacher. Sounds so easy, but when Irene (who is white) ends up paired with Charles (who is black) she has no idea what to feel, except nervous. Irene’s quiet and Charles can talk a mile a minute. This is supposed to be a poetry assignment so the kids decide to pick topics they can both write about. You know. Shoes, hair, school, church, that kind of stuff. And at first their poems just reflect their differences. But as time goes on they see that they have so much more in common than they initially suspected. Lots of things are still unknown to them. “Sometimes we say the wrong thing, sometimes we misunderstand. Now we listen, we ask questions.” Because you can’t know what you don’t know until you dig down deep.
As I mentioned, the book was created by four people. Two wrote the words and two did the art. The Authors’ Note in the back of the book tells how Irene asked Charles to be a “writing partner in a conversation about race” initially and how the book bloomed from there. There’s an Illustrators’ Note at the back as well, talking about how the book should “ignite conversations about race and identity.” You’ve heard the old phrase about too many cooks in the kitchen, but in this case everyone involved appears to have had a role to play. This naturally led me to wonder if Irene and Selina wrote and illustrated the character of Irene while Charles and Sean separately tackled Charles the boy. I don’t think that’s how it played out in the end, but I can’t find any interviews here or online that clarify their process. I think in this case I’ll take a cue from something that does appear in the Illustrators’ Note where Sean and Selina waxed poetic over how, “Mixing together materials mirrors our philosophy of mixing together our cultures.” Like any picture book, this one is words and pictures mixed together into a single cohesive whole. It's art. Mixing is what you have to do.
One challenge the authors faced with this book came in the creation of the characters of Irene and Charles. It’s so interesting that they decided to name the kids in the book after themselves. I wonder if it gave them, as writers, a connection to the material they couldn’t have found otherwise. Certainly, for all that the book is written in verse, there is a depth to the kids and their lives you wouldn’t necessarily expect from poetry. Take Irene. She has a pretty good family, but even her dad is prone to outbursts of anger from time to time. Charles, for his part, is wrestling with complex issues he feels ill-equipped to handle. If cops hurt people that look like him, how does that gel with his understanding of one particular cop that he likes? I like that this book is perfectly willing to raise difficult questions without feeling a need to offer up some kind of easy answers. Sometimes a question has to remain a question to do its job right.
Speaking of questions, you might legitimately ask about the book whether or not it quite lives up to its title. I think we can all agree that it’s one of the best titles of a work of poetry that we’ve seen in years. I was reminded of adult books like Phoebe Robinson’s You Can’t Touch My Hair: And Other Things I Still Have to Explain. So is this a version of Robinson’s book, just siphoned down to something appropriate for the elementary school set? Not exactly, but it is attempting to speak to the same underlying issues. Heck, if this book can prevent just one white kid from asking a black kid, “Can I touch your hair?” it may be worth the cover price alone.
I admire this book deeply not least because there were a couple moments that made me, a grown woman, stop and think. One moment came when Irene saw the black girls playing freeze dance and wanted to join in. After a while one of the girls comes up to Irene and says, “You’ve got the whole rest of the playground . . . Can’t we at least have this corner?” It put me in a mind to recollect a book by Beverly Daniel Tatum called Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?: And Other Conversations About Race. The thing that’s interesting to me about the line as it's written is that the girl (Shonda) says “at least”. She and her friends are making a space for themselves and who can blame them if they don’t want Irene barging in? The book makes Irene the sympathetic one in the scene, but I think there’s room here for a discussion with kids about whether or not Shonda and her friends are wrong to want a place where they don’t have to be “on”. Later Irene and Shonda make up (and I’m not sure I buy how that comes about) but that early interaction stands out for me.
For a long time the idea of writing a book about “diversity” was an exercise in being maudlin. Let me describe an average picture book for you. There is a kid. They are prejudiced in some way. Then with the help of a bunch of friends of different races, religions and/or abilities they are able to see that “we’re all the same under our skin”. You’ve seen this book. You’ve probably seen loads of them, with some slight variations one way or another. What’s interesting to me is that books of this sort find safety in being vague on specifics. I’m a child of the 80s and I grew up with these books, so I saw them all the time. You know what I didn’t see? I never saw a single solitary book that took this message but applied it to black and white kids with the aim of showing the problems, the real problems, that kids are facing. I’m not saying these books don’t exist. They’re out there if you look for them (like the harrowing Whitewash by Ntozake Shange, for example). But a book like that, or like Can I Touch Your Hair? is a drop in the ocean when compared to the countless titles that want to promote difference without ever being different themselves. Given the chance, I suggest you try something a little bit different. Try this book. Just be prepared to answer some hard and necessary questions from kids along the way.
For ages 6 and up.
February 4, 2019
I don't even know how to write this review. I'll probably be called a racist no matter what. The book wants to start a dialogue, though, so here goes:
The feeling I get after reading this book as a white person is guilt. Why? I can't quite explain it, but it probably has something to do with the way white people are demonized throughout the text. Apparently, we all hate black people, yet paradoxically want to be them at the same time. If we braid our hair a certain way, or get a tan, or want to join a game of freeze dance, we're stepping on toes. Now, as an adult, I can see where all of this is coming from, but I can imagine that these messages could be quite confusing for kids. The part when Irene sees her black classmate's family tree with the chains in the branches to represent slavery is potentially even more confusing. Irene feels she needs to apologize to the girl, but I don't think she even knows why. There's a difference between saying, "I'm sorry this happened to you," and, "I'm sorry I did this to you." Unfortunately, the distinction isn't made clear, which could potentially leave young white readers with a sense that they're supposed to apologize for something... though they may not know what.
I think part of the problem I had with this book is that it reads like historical fiction. The names of some of the kids aren't that modern, so I thought maybe it took place in the past. That would explain things like Irene's father beating his children with a paddle (this is normalized, which I did not like; there are other ways to teach children respect other than giving them hypocritical messages by disrespectfully abusing their bodies). Charles is newly vegan, and he eats nothing but rice, beans, and pumpkin, while the rest of his family chows down on soul food. Today, there's no reason he couldn't have vegan soul food... so it's either a dated representation of veganism, or simply a lazy one. Also, if this isn't a historical representation of race relations in an American elementary school, then the US has a major problem. (Well... I think the rest of the world already knew that.) I have a really hard time relating as a Canadian, because it's just not something that happens the same way here. We're not perfect, of course, and there is discrimination... but up until recently when Trump-era morals brought all the bigots out of the woodwork, it was usually based on things other than skin colour (religion and language being a couple of the major issues). It doesn't make sense to discriminate over something that 1) has nothing to do with what kind of person you are, and 2) nobody has any control over. But that seems to be what's happening with the characters in this book. (The authors' note at the end says that they wanted to write about a school with a 60% white and 40% minority population. You could be forgiven for thinking that it's more unbalanced than that, based on the text and the amount of prejudice that's happening.)
The format of this book didn't really work for me, either. It comes across more as two kids talking about their problems individually than any sort of back-and-forth dialogue. For much of the book, it doesn't seem like Irene and Charles have that much contact with each other at all. And the poems themselves? I wasn't impressed. Apparently, all you have to do to write poetry today is be artful with your line breaks. There's no rhyme, no meter, and no flow. Aside from having one poem from each kid for each topic, there wasn't really anything that drew the poems together into something cohesive.
I've read a couple of other picture books illustrated by Qualls and Alko, and I haven't been a huge fan of the pictures there, either. They're just not for me.
While I appreciate what this book was trying to do, I don't think it really got there. I would've rather seen a picture book with an actual story (about either of the kids separately, or both together). Also, it needed to pick a time period and not try to mix the ideas and perceptions of the 1980s with those of the 2010s; that just didn't work. This book was a disappointment, not least because it seems to blame white people for everything that's wrong without enough context; this is a kids' picture book, after all, not a literary chapbook for adults who are used to dissecting what they read.
The feeling I get after reading this book as a white person is guilt. Why? I can't quite explain it, but it probably has something to do with the way white people are demonized throughout the text. Apparently, we all hate black people, yet paradoxically want to be them at the same time. If we braid our hair a certain way, or get a tan, or want to join a game of freeze dance, we're stepping on toes. Now, as an adult, I can see where all of this is coming from, but I can imagine that these messages could be quite confusing for kids. The part when Irene sees her black classmate's family tree with the chains in the branches to represent slavery is potentially even more confusing. Irene feels she needs to apologize to the girl, but I don't think she even knows why. There's a difference between saying, "I'm sorry this happened to you," and, "I'm sorry I did this to you." Unfortunately, the distinction isn't made clear, which could potentially leave young white readers with a sense that they're supposed to apologize for something... though they may not know what.
I think part of the problem I had with this book is that it reads like historical fiction. The names of some of the kids aren't that modern, so I thought maybe it took place in the past. That would explain things like Irene's father beating his children with a paddle (this is normalized, which I did not like; there are other ways to teach children respect other than giving them hypocritical messages by disrespectfully abusing their bodies). Charles is newly vegan, and he eats nothing but rice, beans, and pumpkin, while the rest of his family chows down on soul food. Today, there's no reason he couldn't have vegan soul food... so it's either a dated representation of veganism, or simply a lazy one. Also, if this isn't a historical representation of race relations in an American elementary school, then the US has a major problem. (Well... I think the rest of the world already knew that.) I have a really hard time relating as a Canadian, because it's just not something that happens the same way here. We're not perfect, of course, and there is discrimination... but up until recently when Trump-era morals brought all the bigots out of the woodwork, it was usually based on things other than skin colour (religion and language being a couple of the major issues). It doesn't make sense to discriminate over something that 1) has nothing to do with what kind of person you are, and 2) nobody has any control over. But that seems to be what's happening with the characters in this book. (The authors' note at the end says that they wanted to write about a school with a 60% white and 40% minority population. You could be forgiven for thinking that it's more unbalanced than that, based on the text and the amount of prejudice that's happening.)
The format of this book didn't really work for me, either. It comes across more as two kids talking about their problems individually than any sort of back-and-forth dialogue. For much of the book, it doesn't seem like Irene and Charles have that much contact with each other at all. And the poems themselves? I wasn't impressed. Apparently, all you have to do to write poetry today is be artful with your line breaks. There's no rhyme, no meter, and no flow. Aside from having one poem from each kid for each topic, there wasn't really anything that drew the poems together into something cohesive.
I've read a couple of other picture books illustrated by Qualls and Alko, and I haven't been a huge fan of the pictures there, either. They're just not for me.
While I appreciate what this book was trying to do, I don't think it really got there. I would've rather seen a picture book with an actual story (about either of the kids separately, or both together). Also, it needed to pick a time period and not try to mix the ideas and perceptions of the 1980s with those of the 2010s; that just didn't work. This book was a disappointment, not least because it seems to blame white people for everything that's wrong without enough context; this is a kids' picture book, after all, not a literary chapbook for adults who are used to dissecting what they read.
March 27, 2018
When students Irene and Charles end up as partners for a poem-writing project, they slowly and bravely begin to explore how the issue of race affects their lives. Irene’s white perspective and Charles’s black perspective are inherent even when they begin by writing about a subject seemingly devoid of racial context—shoes. Their next topic, hair, opens a dialogue that includes the emotional effects of race-based conflicts at school. As the children move on to poems involving their friends and families, readers sense a developing trust and warmth that leads to a beautiful jointly-written poem at the end. For more insights into the evolution of Can I Touch Your Hair? listen to the authors on the February 25, 2018 episode of The Yarn podcast.
April 22, 2018
A lovely book that gives a nudge to readers about the need to move gently into uncomfortable conversations rather than avoid them completely.
June 27, 2019
A decent tool to start a conversation with kids about race, diversity, microaggressions, etc. It's a cute concept, where the authors, a black man and a white woman, imagine how they might have developed a friendship if they had gone to school together as children. It says it's poetry, but don't let that scare you off, as it is free verse where sentences just seem to have random hard returns in the middle of them.
July 24, 2018
Has a great premise and lofty goals, but ultimately I didn't feel it achieved them. So many issues were raised, mostly around race, and then not dealt with. This would be a great conversation starter for a class assignment, but as a stand-alone book, I felt a lot of issues needed more nuance, more context, more discussion, just more. Trigger warning for the pages that touch on child abuse, which is brought up matter-of-factly as discipline and not mentioned again. Most of the other issues are around race and identity and microaggressions, but also touch on police brutality, housing segregation, cultural appropriation, stereotypes, white privilege, and bullying.
The poems and the illustrations work beautifully together; the art is soft and emotive and expressive and really adds emotional depth and nuance to the words. I LOVE that the poems themselves aid in character development: Irene is characterized as shy and not wordy, and her poems are sparse and brief as compared to Charles's longer descriptive style. I also really like that the book is framed as a poetry assignment but doesn't feel like just their poetry assignment. It's very novel-in-verse, and several poems go introspective or play-by-play in a way that makes me feel part of the story.
Overall, it's a good book. Kids and teens will get a lot out of it and see their world reflected. This could be an opening for larger discussion and dialogue. I didn't feel that it was distinguished, and it fell short of its aims.
The poems and the illustrations work beautifully together; the art is soft and emotive and expressive and really adds emotional depth and nuance to the words. I LOVE that the poems themselves aid in character development: Irene is characterized as shy and not wordy, and her poems are sparse and brief as compared to Charles's longer descriptive style. I also really like that the book is framed as a poetry assignment but doesn't feel like just their poetry assignment. It's very novel-in-verse, and several poems go introspective or play-by-play in a way that makes me feel part of the story.
Overall, it's a good book. Kids and teens will get a lot out of it and see their world reflected. This could be an opening for larger discussion and dialogue. I didn't feel that it was distinguished, and it fell short of its aims.
May 4, 2018
Moving, smart, brief book of accessible poetry aimed at kids, but a great read for any age. I didn't realize it was a children's book when I ordered it from the library. So glad I read it.
Treat yourself!
Treat yourself!
December 15, 2018
Straight forward, earnest talk about on issue that, at times, can be difficult to talk of.
February 18, 2018
I love, love, love this book of poetry. I initially picked it up because I love books that talk about manners regarding things we may not always think about. When it comes to manners and etiquette, it is so much more than please/thank you, or which fork to eat salad with. Especially when it comes to race and gender.
Latham pairs two poems on similar subjects: one from the perspective of a black boy, and another from a white girl. The poems discuss things like family, making friends, food, etc. and how both kids learn about race and the world around them. One particularly poignant moment is when the boy wants to be a vegetarian, but he feels as if he'd be neglecting the food of his culture (and experiences tremendous guilt).
I also checked this book out for the illustrators. I absolutely LOVE Sean Qualls and Selina Alko. The accompanying pictures are beautiful. This book is tens across the board, and a worthwhile discussion piece.
-Amanda T.
Latham pairs two poems on similar subjects: one from the perspective of a black boy, and another from a white girl. The poems discuss things like family, making friends, food, etc. and how both kids learn about race and the world around them. One particularly poignant moment is when the boy wants to be a vegetarian, but he feels as if he'd be neglecting the food of his culture (and experiences tremendous guilt).
I also checked this book out for the illustrators. I absolutely LOVE Sean Qualls and Selina Alko. The accompanying pictures are beautiful. This book is tens across the board, and a worthwhile discussion piece.
-Amanda T.
June 27, 2019
smart, accessible, important. definitely inspiring me to read more picture books and put them in my classroom.
February 24, 2021
I think I would have said this was heavy handed if I hadn't read it with my 6-year-old. I don't think it was that I underestimated him so much as I just didn't expect it to resonate with him like it did. But I think friendship is a concept that kids in early elementary grades spend a LOT of time thinking about and figuring out so framing this book in the context of a friendship is brilliant and I think sands off some of the edges. He noticed a lot of things I didn't, like when the characters came together in the picture and when they did not. He and I have talked about race before but I appreciated the opening to talk to him about very specific things, like the conversation about hair and also something like Trayvon Martin, which happened when he was a baby.
This is both very simple and super not oversimplified, which is good, and it respects and encourages conversation, which is better. It even explicitly points out how sometimes adults shut down conversations where kids are trying to learn from each other because they are afraid of race conversations (and with them accusations of racism) entering their classrooms and homes. That was profound. There's a lot to this book...but it is also a back and forth about two kids becoming friends and completing a school assignment so it is 100% relatable.
As a read aloud, negotiating the two voices can be a challenge, especially since they don't always go in the same order, which I understand.
Love the illustrations. This is the same illustration team that did The Case for Loving, which also had great illustrations. Read the illustrators and authors notes in the back for sure.
I wasn't sure whether to call this a novel in verse or a picture book. It's sort of a hybrid of the two.
This is both very simple and super not oversimplified, which is good, and it respects and encourages conversation, which is better. It even explicitly points out how sometimes adults shut down conversations where kids are trying to learn from each other because they are afraid of race conversations (and with them accusations of racism) entering their classrooms and homes. That was profound. There's a lot to this book...but it is also a back and forth about two kids becoming friends and completing a school assignment so it is 100% relatable.
As a read aloud, negotiating the two voices can be a challenge, especially since they don't always go in the same order, which I understand.
Love the illustrations. This is the same illustration team that did The Case for Loving, which also had great illustrations. Read the illustrators and authors notes in the back for sure.
I wasn't sure whether to call this a novel in verse or a picture book. It's sort of a hybrid of the two.
May 1, 2018
Quite an original collection of poetry about two children who are paired together for a poetry project. Initially judging each other on the basis of the colour of their skin, Irene and Charles are reluctant to get to know one another. However, a friendship begins to grow as they open up through their poetry writing, gradually realising that their lives are more similar than they first thought, each having rocky home lives and having made regretful mistakes.
To me, it was not the poetry that makes this book stand out, it is the way that it so honestly breaks down barriers placed between children. The poems are very thought provoking, highlighting the massive hypocrisy within prejudice, and making the reader question where the root to this comes from. When children are so easily alienating themselves from those who are 'different', with little reason for doing so, it really does say something about our responsibility to open children's hearts and minds by talking to them about damaging ideas that they may have internalised without realising.
To me, it was not the poetry that makes this book stand out, it is the way that it so honestly breaks down barriers placed between children. The poems are very thought provoking, highlighting the massive hypocrisy within prejudice, and making the reader question where the root to this comes from. When children are so easily alienating themselves from those who are 'different', with little reason for doing so, it really does say something about our responsibility to open children's hearts and minds by talking to them about damaging ideas that they may have internalised without realising.
November 6, 2017
This book is a tough one for young children. I am not sure if they would understand the concept. I think older primary and junior or intermediate students would understand the messages much better. This is not poetry that rhymes or follows patterns, it is free-style with a serious message. The poems depict situations that the authors have either been involved in or witnessed. It shows that there still are race issues in our society, but there is hope they can be overcome with listening to others, taking time to understand others' situations and feelings. A book that could be used to start the discussion about race issues in a middle grades or even intermediate classroom. The publisher generously provided me with a copy of this book via Netgalley.
March 6, 2018
Goodreads app, I am furious with you! Just wrote a very heartfelt review for 45 minutes, only to have it disappear upon posting. Aaarrrggghh!
August 24, 2020
| Review on Reader Fox Blog |
I hate to say it, but I feel genuinely underwhelmed by Irene Latham and Charles Waters' Can I Touch Your Hair?: Poems of Race, Mistakes, and Friendship. The book is illustrated by Sean Qualls and Selina Alko, though the only image I really ever saw was the cover since I got this book in audio format. In that sense, I can't really speak to the artwork other than to say that the cover is cute, but not my favorite. Truthfully, I'm not sure if the audio played a role in my feeling underwhelmed. But the audio doesn't seem like the best format for this book.
A conversation about race.
Can I Touch Your Hair? seems like the sort of book that's intended to create a conversation. This is incredible since we really do need to be discussing race more often and, yes, with our children. The problem comes in with the fact that the conversation about race isn't always clear enough. When told from the perspectives of two young children just beginning to understand race themselves, that's not surprising. Many issues are raised, however, very few are discussed further. I think the closest it ever came was during the conversation of school shootings. Even then, due to it's short poem format, the book doesn't really delve deeply into much.
As a book for parents to use to begin a conversation, this book isn't that bad. As something a kid is coming across on their own, it's less impressive. I liked the introduction to poetry and I liked the introduction to conversations about race... But there are a lot of missed opportunities to really build more upon the conversation as a whole. We're foisted into the lives and experiences of these two children without ever really getting the time to digest and understand what these experiences truly mean. As an adult, you can recognize many of those themes and features. But I don't think children will be able to.
Yay, narration
I love spoken out loud poetry. It's one of my favorite things in the whole world. That said, I couldn't really get into it here. I'd always thought poetry as an audiobook would be amazing, but this book was here to prove me wrong. I got distracted so many times while listening that I had to listen three times before I managed to catch all of the moments. And so much of it never really had the impact I was hoping it would. Whether that is an issue with the poetry itself or the narration, I can't say for sure.
In the end, one truth remains clear; this book is difficult to focus on in audio format.
As a final note:
I'm honestly really disgusted by the fact that paddle-spanking disciplinary measures were included in the first place, let alone completely glossed over as though it's perfectly acceptable to hit your kid with a block of wood. I don't care how normalized this was in the past or if it was something Irene experienced as a child, herself. The fact is that it shouldn't have a place in a children's picture book in the year 2020. It especially shouldn't have a place when it is suggesting that this sort of child abuse isn't problematic.
For that single moment alone, I would never read this book to a child of mine. I am certain that there are many other books out there discussing race that I could use without having to subject a young mind to the suggestion that a parent hitting them in this abusive manner is okay.
So, while this book has some merits, I ultimately just found myself disappointed for a number of reasons. It's one of those things where I find myself respecting the main goal of this work, but I do feel that there are many books that handle it in a much better way.
I was provided a free copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
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I hate to say it, but I feel genuinely underwhelmed by Irene Latham and Charles Waters' Can I Touch Your Hair?: Poems of Race, Mistakes, and Friendship. The book is illustrated by Sean Qualls and Selina Alko, though the only image I really ever saw was the cover since I got this book in audio format. In that sense, I can't really speak to the artwork other than to say that the cover is cute, but not my favorite. Truthfully, I'm not sure if the audio played a role in my feeling underwhelmed. But the audio doesn't seem like the best format for this book.
A conversation about race.
Can I Touch Your Hair? seems like the sort of book that's intended to create a conversation. This is incredible since we really do need to be discussing race more often and, yes, with our children. The problem comes in with the fact that the conversation about race isn't always clear enough. When told from the perspectives of two young children just beginning to understand race themselves, that's not surprising. Many issues are raised, however, very few are discussed further. I think the closest it ever came was during the conversation of school shootings. Even then, due to it's short poem format, the book doesn't really delve deeply into much.
As a book for parents to use to begin a conversation, this book isn't that bad. As something a kid is coming across on their own, it's less impressive. I liked the introduction to poetry and I liked the introduction to conversations about race... But there are a lot of missed opportunities to really build more upon the conversation as a whole. We're foisted into the lives and experiences of these two children without ever really getting the time to digest and understand what these experiences truly mean. As an adult, you can recognize many of those themes and features. But I don't think children will be able to.
Yay, narration
I love spoken out loud poetry. It's one of my favorite things in the whole world. That said, I couldn't really get into it here. I'd always thought poetry as an audiobook would be amazing, but this book was here to prove me wrong. I got distracted so many times while listening that I had to listen three times before I managed to catch all of the moments. And so much of it never really had the impact I was hoping it would. Whether that is an issue with the poetry itself or the narration, I can't say for sure.
In the end, one truth remains clear; this book is difficult to focus on in audio format.
As a final note:
I'm honestly really disgusted by the fact that paddle-spanking disciplinary measures were included in the first place, let alone completely glossed over as though it's perfectly acceptable to hit your kid with a block of wood. I don't care how normalized this was in the past or if it was something Irene experienced as a child, herself. The fact is that it shouldn't have a place in a children's picture book in the year 2020. It especially shouldn't have a place when it is suggesting that this sort of child abuse isn't problematic.
For that single moment alone, I would never read this book to a child of mine. I am certain that there are many other books out there discussing race that I could use without having to subject a young mind to the suggestion that a parent hitting them in this abusive manner is okay.
So, while this book has some merits, I ultimately just found myself disappointed for a number of reasons. It's one of those things where I find myself respecting the main goal of this work, but I do feel that there are many books that handle it in a much better way.
I was provided a free copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
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May 26, 2020
I cannot wait to read this aloud to my middle schoolers. This book illustrates the dangers of judging books by their covers and the illuminating joys of being open-minded to unlikely friendships. I think every age would get something important out of this picture book.
August 18, 2018
The authors Irene Latham and Charles Waters collaborate in this book of poems that centers around the idea: what if they had met as poetry project partners in a contemporary fifth grade classroom? As a white girl and a black boy, what kinds of misunderstandings, differences, and similarities would they have? In alternating POV poems, questions of race and friendship are explored.
These questions are not always answered— this is one of those books you’re likely to label a “conversation-starter.” This book does not really explore any questions of race in depth, but does present a picture of two children whose lives/experiences/opinions are affected by their identity.
Despite references to things like Trayvon Martin and Ferguson, this book did not feel like it was set in modern times. It’s very clear that the authors were actually children in the eighties, from references to cooking oil being used to tan to a black mother being surprised by the “N-bomb” being dropped in a song. And the characters didn’t feel like children in places, like when Charles declares that he is vegan, and doesn’t everyone know that soul food leads to diabetes and cancer?
Can I Touch Your Hair is thought-provoking but somewhat lacking in depth overall. The authors’ and illustrators’ notes in the back are interesting and definitely worth a read.
(Also I was uncomfortable when Irene seemed to compare a black character to the Black Stallion...? What was that?)
These questions are not always answered— this is one of those books you’re likely to label a “conversation-starter.” This book does not really explore any questions of race in depth, but does present a picture of two children whose lives/experiences/opinions are affected by their identity.
Despite references to things like Trayvon Martin and Ferguson, this book did not feel like it was set in modern times. It’s very clear that the authors were actually children in the eighties, from references to cooking oil being used to tan to a black mother being surprised by the “N-bomb” being dropped in a song. And the characters didn’t feel like children in places, like when Charles declares that he is vegan, and doesn’t everyone know that soul food leads to diabetes and cancer?
Can I Touch Your Hair is thought-provoking but somewhat lacking in depth overall. The authors’ and illustrators’ notes in the back are interesting and definitely worth a read.
(Also I was uncomfortable when Irene seemed to compare a black character to the Black Stallion...? What was that?)
July 6, 2018
Could this join Joyful Noise as Newbery winning poetry? Fingers crossed. Latham and Waters write as fifth graders named Irene and Charles who have dialogue and epiphanies about race when they are not voluntarily matched as partners for a poetry project. The poems tackle serious issues -- the N word, Ferguson, White guilt, and a blue-eyed Jesus in a Black church, for example. The creators' statements at the end of the book are as important as the poems. The poets have never met IRL. The illustrators are a Black and White married couple. This contribution to children's literature is an experience that all teachers and parents should share with children and teens. There is an "Unless" rock in here that we all should acknowledge.
The artwork is laudable BUT this book is a too-common challenge for all middle grade and junior high educators -- the poems are for OLDER children and the illustrations are childish. Publishers, I beg you to republish this in a teen-friendly format, and it will be read and taught and discussed along with The Hate U Give and Dear Martin.
The artwork is laudable BUT this book is a too-common challenge for all middle grade and junior high educators -- the poems are for OLDER children and the illustrations are childish. Publishers, I beg you to republish this in a teen-friendly format, and it will be read and taught and discussed along with The Hate U Give and Dear Martin.
April 4, 2018
The back of the book summed it up perfectly for me:
""Can I Touch Your Hair? is a compelling portrait of two youngsters dancing delicately through a racial minefield.""-J. Patrick Lewis, former US Children's Poet Laureate
I also enjoyed it because it was easy to relate to the poetry, from the touching of his hair to praising a blonde hair, blue eyed Jesus in Sunday church service. I can also relate to making friends with white kids at this age in a similar manner.
This book presents a overwhelmingly difficult topic with prose that at first appears light and easy, but then you realize the content is hard to swallow. However, the beautiful and muddled illustrations makes this book that much more approachable.
""Can I Touch Your Hair? is a compelling portrait of two youngsters dancing delicately through a racial minefield.""-J. Patrick Lewis, former US Children's Poet Laureate
I also enjoyed it because it was easy to relate to the poetry, from the touching of his hair to praising a blonde hair, blue eyed Jesus in Sunday church service. I can also relate to making friends with white kids at this age in a similar manner.
This book presents a overwhelmingly difficult topic with prose that at first appears light and easy, but then you realize the content is hard to swallow. However, the beautiful and muddled illustrations makes this book that much more approachable.
January 23, 2018
I was intrigued by this idea of kids trying to understand race and each other through an alternating-voices novel-in-verse. But I found the poems a little shallow and didactic, and it didn't have a great flow. And I don't really like the illustrations, so that doesn't help.
November 19, 2017
This is a novel in verse for younger readers features two children from the same classroom and how they see the world around them.
March 21, 2018
Loved the format and message. Some of the poetry didn't feel like poetry to me. But maybe I just don't know poetry.
August 23, 2020
In the midst of the pandemic, the BLM movement, and all the other stuff going on during the summer of 2020, and having been watching lots of TEDx Talks regarding EDI, I happened upon this collection of poems.
Black and White --- no GRAY--- are never what they seem.
Written from the point of view of fifth graders, Charles and Irene (the real co-authors of this book) become poem partners in Mrs. Vandenberg's class, not because they want to, it's just that everyone has already partnered off, leaving Irene (white) and Charles (black) no other choice. Skeptical at first, not wanting to really share, things occur during school, that eventually bring them a more focused view into the other's lives.
Black and White --- no GRAY--- are never what they seem.
Written from the point of view of fifth graders, Charles and Irene (the real co-authors of this book) become poem partners in Mrs. Vandenberg's class, not because they want to, it's just that everyone has already partnered off, leaving Irene (white) and Charles (black) no other choice. Skeptical at first, not wanting to really share, things occur during school, that eventually bring them a more focused view into the other's lives.
June 2, 2020
A very sweet story told through poems of a boy and a girl who, despite racial and other differences, end up finding that what they have in common and what they can learn from each other is most important.
May 28, 2021
Honest and real and kid-appropriate. The poetry is outstanding. Unity comes from understanding, this book is a step in the right direction.
January 16, 2023
Rather odd. There were no poems though the premise was a poem project between 2 children. Didn’t feel true as to child actions and emotions. One really odd phrasing was the complaint of why is everyone (brown, in the brown church) praising the blue-eyed white man looking down ( from their cross). It’s their church; l’m sure they would have had a more representational Jesus. No one’s forcing them to have a white Jesus.
January 13, 2018
Irene and Charles tell a story with poetry in their new book, Can I Touch Your Hair? Poems of Race, Mistakes, and Friendship, of a boy’s and a girl’s inner feelings, about self, feelings about each other, universal kid concerns and deeper racial questions. Through sharing parts of those feelings, about what might be termed “safe” subjects, these two kids learn about each other, learn that they have a few common likes and dislikes. Maybe they can even be friends? It is a good path but doesn’t start well. Irene and Charles (the authors use their own names as they tell the story) are forced to work together on a Poem Project: As partners are chosen, Irene thinks: “you-never-know-what/he’s-going-to-say Charles/is the only one left.” And Charles: “She hardly says anything. Plus, she’s white.”
I read the book to my granddaughters this week. They are Ingrid, eight and Imogene, six. Imogene is perhaps too young for all the poems but when we came to the poems about hair, her response was that everyone should know not to touch anyone without permission, and Ingrid, with hair like Irene, “long and straight--/a curtain I can hide/behind “ laughed and said, “that’s true, I can.” Charles’ words showed how angry he felt when someone patted his head, said “It feels like a sponge.” Then, Charles patted that person’s head, said back, “Your hair feels like a mop.” The girls laughed, said, "That’s good, he took up for himself. He didn't stay quiet.” Some might say this book is only for older kids, wa-ay older, yet the girls took what connected to them at this time, and will understand and think about more as they re-read it.
I don’t want to dwell on two young girls’ responses but will say they enjoyed the book and commented on most of one theme of the story, that people, kids just like in their classrooms, are different, and it’s good to get to know them because they might become good friends. Friendship is important to kids as they navigate growing up, and the more experiences they have with people, the more they will feel good about who they are, and that it’s okay for them to have different looks, different favorites, experiences, and families.
I smiled when I read the poems about shoes. That topic is one that students love. This time, Charles and Irene discover some common ground; both have wishes for shoes that aren’t granted. Irene tells: “Mama says/shoes should be/sensible--“ Charles also shows disappointment: “Dad hands me a pair of low tops,/no cool design, no bright color or dynamite laces.” As these two partners travel through their lives, we read of things that are the same and things different, yet the feelings are deep-down the same. No matter who they are, the feelings about race emerge, and that will spark good talk, for older kids, maybe research. Charles gets picked first in basketball, but when he sails the ball over the backboard, he gets picked last after that. Irene burst out at Charles that “sometimes I just need/a break from people.” but goes on to talk about the sweetness of her horseback riding.
We readers, like Charles and Irene, are getting to know these kids’ deeper feelings in a wonderfully poetic way. There are things they think, hope, dream, and question. The poems deepen in topic, bringing up mistakes and apologies, hard things like the N bomb and thoughts about police, the good and the bad. It’s a story in verse, brief poems of how things are with two kids. They come together at the end, lining up to meet the author Nikki Grimes, both fans, celebrating the good fortune to meet their favorite writer.
The poems face each other on the pages and Sean Qualls and Selina Alko create the pages with pictures of Irene and Charles, showing emotions on their faces as well as important parts of the topic. The collages are mixed up in varying colors and feel just right for each double page. Joyful hearts and shadows, loneliness and satisfaction lie in the words and the pictures.
I read the book to my granddaughters this week. They are Ingrid, eight and Imogene, six. Imogene is perhaps too young for all the poems but when we came to the poems about hair, her response was that everyone should know not to touch anyone without permission, and Ingrid, with hair like Irene, “long and straight--/a curtain I can hide/behind “ laughed and said, “that’s true, I can.” Charles’ words showed how angry he felt when someone patted his head, said “It feels like a sponge.” Then, Charles patted that person’s head, said back, “Your hair feels like a mop.” The girls laughed, said, "That’s good, he took up for himself. He didn't stay quiet.” Some might say this book is only for older kids, wa-ay older, yet the girls took what connected to them at this time, and will understand and think about more as they re-read it.
I don’t want to dwell on two young girls’ responses but will say they enjoyed the book and commented on most of one theme of the story, that people, kids just like in their classrooms, are different, and it’s good to get to know them because they might become good friends. Friendship is important to kids as they navigate growing up, and the more experiences they have with people, the more they will feel good about who they are, and that it’s okay for them to have different looks, different favorites, experiences, and families.
I smiled when I read the poems about shoes. That topic is one that students love. This time, Charles and Irene discover some common ground; both have wishes for shoes that aren’t granted. Irene tells: “Mama says/shoes should be/sensible--“ Charles also shows disappointment: “Dad hands me a pair of low tops,/no cool design, no bright color or dynamite laces.” As these two partners travel through their lives, we read of things that are the same and things different, yet the feelings are deep-down the same. No matter who they are, the feelings about race emerge, and that will spark good talk, for older kids, maybe research. Charles gets picked first in basketball, but when he sails the ball over the backboard, he gets picked last after that. Irene burst out at Charles that “sometimes I just need/a break from people.” but goes on to talk about the sweetness of her horseback riding.
We readers, like Charles and Irene, are getting to know these kids’ deeper feelings in a wonderfully poetic way. There are things they think, hope, dream, and question. The poems deepen in topic, bringing up mistakes and apologies, hard things like the N bomb and thoughts about police, the good and the bad. It’s a story in verse, brief poems of how things are with two kids. They come together at the end, lining up to meet the author Nikki Grimes, both fans, celebrating the good fortune to meet their favorite writer.
The poems face each other on the pages and Sean Qualls and Selina Alko create the pages with pictures of Irene and Charles, showing emotions on their faces as well as important parts of the topic. The collages are mixed up in varying colors and feel just right for each double page. Joyful hearts and shadows, loneliness and satisfaction lie in the words and the pictures.
April 4, 2020
This book of poetry mirrors the thoughts of two students, one White girl and one African American boy. They are partnered to write poetry based on their experiences and interests, and they see just how alike and different they are. This is a WOW book for me because it explores these two students as being different because of their race but it focuses on them as individual people with interests and personalities that make them similar. I also like how it showcases how African American students are treated differently in school through micro-aggressions that most children don't understand is hurtful, so this book teaches children in a kid-friendly way how to treat others with respect.
I would use this book in third grade to teach about empathy and kindness, also how to be a productive member of society. That includes working with people who are different from you even if it seems hard, and that you must learn to understand other people's point of view. I would use this at the beginning of the year when students don't know each other well, and pair them with each other to do the same poetry project that is shown in the book. They would write a few poetry pieces that mirror each other, as in they would write about the same thing but their individual perspective on it. Then they would read each other's and reflect on how their perspectives are similar and different. Hopefully they would make a new friend in the process!
I would use this book in third grade to teach about empathy and kindness, also how to be a productive member of society. That includes working with people who are different from you even if it seems hard, and that you must learn to understand other people's point of view. I would use this at the beginning of the year when students don't know each other well, and pair them with each other to do the same poetry project that is shown in the book. They would write a few poetry pieces that mirror each other, as in they would write about the same thing but their individual perspective on it. Then they would read each other's and reflect on how their perspectives are similar and different. Hopefully they would make a new friend in the process!
May 18, 2019
Can I Touch Your Hair?: Poems of Race, Mistakes, and Friendship technically contains poems about more than race, but the only poems about race seem to come from Charles and not Irene. While Irene talks about horses and reading The Black Stallion three times, Charles writes about the constant mistreatment he receives. So, while I expected this book to be a two-sided conversation, I should have lowered my expectations. I feel that La Coccinelle’s review quite perfectly sums up most of my complicated feelings about this book.
I would like to nitpick and cite specific examples of misconceptions, one-sided arguments to issues, and general shaming that a reader the level to whom this book is catered would not understand, but I also feel that it would do no good and I would get blasted. I feel the word “conversation” or “dialogue” used to describe this book is a misnomer. It’s more of a “talk at” or “self-talk” than anything else.
On a positive note, I absolutely loved the mesmerizing, imaginative artwork.
I would like to nitpick and cite specific examples of misconceptions, one-sided arguments to issues, and general shaming that a reader the level to whom this book is catered would not understand, but I also feel that it would do no good and I would get blasted. I feel the word “conversation” or “dialogue” used to describe this book is a misnomer. It’s more of a “talk at” or “self-talk” than anything else.
On a positive note, I absolutely loved the mesmerizing, imaginative artwork.
July 20, 2022
An open-hearted, sincere book by a white poet named Irene and a Black poet named Charles. It’s an exchange of poems by two fifth graders....a white girl named Irene and an Black boy named Charles. The poems address a variety of topics (Irene’s love of horses, Charles’s newfound veganism) but keep circling back to race. The authors’ good intentions and some individually lovely poems don’t really make us feel connected to either kid as a fleshed-out character — they remain flat, unknown. And the art feels stiff, stilted and small to me. (Maybe if the trim size were larger the art would work better? It’s hard to see all the textures or read the snippets of collage.) I could see a skilled, sensitive teacher or librarian making great use of this in the classroom. There’s a link to a teachers’ guide here: https://lernerbooks.blog/2018/01/can-....
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