First, SDAI, I'm surprised at you: Cinderella has not been eliminated from the classroom because of the lack of people of color, but rather because of the emphasis on physical appearance over character regarding the heroine's situation. ;)

The overcorrection in literary criticism on the web page you linked to is unfortunate -- we can't expect to have stories set in Europe to include black and Asian characters, as you have quite rightly pointed out.

Consider for a minute a school that has Asian students, or black students, or Hispanic students. Is it unreasonable to insist that teachers and librarians look for books that depict people who look like these students in positive ways? I believe this is an appropriate aim. Unfortunately, when a list like this is applied to that objective, the objective itself is often held up to ridicule rather than the extreme methods suggested to achieve it.

I can think of a group of picture books that adhere to the guidelines without being senseless or agenda-driven: the Arthur books by Marc Brown, which are now available as animated cartoons and as early reader chapter books. Brown avoids the race issue altogether: his characters are aardvarks, rabbits, chimps, rats, and an assortment of other animals. He avoids the stereotyped gender behaviors by giving his characters distinct personalities that don't necessarily reflect gender preconceptions. Girls can be in charge and athletic, boys can be neat and nurturing. And they are. The family structures vary, and all ages are depicted as having a potential to make a positive contribution. The stories vary also, from a silly blind date at the movies on Valentine's Day to a serious case of betrayal in which one character frames another for cheating.

Also, there has been a resurgence in interest in the Cinderella story, which has had myriad expressions in cultures that range worldwide, beginning in ancient Egypt. Instead of concentrating solely on the Perrault version of the tale, it can't hurt to explore a number of connected folktales from other lands. This approach adds depth to even the youngest child's understanding of the story, and can help to include children who see themselves as having nothing in common with the story of a French girl who rides to court in a pumpkin.

Incidentally, Cinderella is being retold in ways that give additional depth to the long-suffering heroine. My favorite is Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine. Ella is a girl of wit, talent and courage who was given an unfortunate gift in her infancy by a fairy: the gift of obedience. Her struggle to find ways to be herself and not to do whatever she is told, for good or evil, shows her not as a pawn in a power game but as a player in her own life. If this is PC, it's still an improvement.

I think the checklist, if used without moderation and as a kind of canon, is silly. As a list of suggestions, though, it may not be as dreadful as people seem to think. "Savage Indians"? I know people who only want books about the settlement of the American West with old copyright dates because -- and I'm quoting here -- "modern books don't show them as the cruel pagan savages they were". Blacks were depicted as intellectually dim in the days of segregation and Jim Crow because that depiction justified blacks' second-class citizenship. And don't even get me started on "the weaker sex". Literature has perpetuated these concepts; its role needs to be examined and understood, but not censored.

The checklist looks to me like a fierce overcorrection for past inaccuracies and omissions that have been harmful in that they perpetuate lies, and hurtful to the people whose images were cultivated incorrectly. We'd have to be idiots to allow it to dictate our behavior, but I suggest that we would have to be fools not to meditate on why it exists at all.

Regards--
Mary Anne