A Thematic Study of Selected Nigerian Children’s Literary Texts

This study was set to investigate the subject-matter of each of selected children’s literature, highlight the common themes of selected children’s storybooks and assess the appropriateness of the themes of the selected children’s storybooks to the cultural and social adjustment to society's expected norms and values. Primary and secondary sources were used in data collection. The primary source comprised 15 purposively selected children’s books, five each from age range four to six, seven to nine and ten to twelve, respectively. The secondary source included books, journal articles and the Internet. Data were analysed using social semiotic theory with insights from Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar. The study found that all the storybooks selected for this study have varying subject matters. The major themes of children’s literature in Nigeria are crime and punishment, the value of education, reward for hard work and good virtue, bad habits and their consequences, and disobedience and their aftermaths. The study asserts that the themes of selected texts are relevant to the contemporary Nigerian social context. All the storybooks under investigation in this study took cognisance of the cultural milieus of the readers, and the themes are appropriate for the target audiences; and for the education of the target audience. Therefore, more literary texts should be written to sustain the tempo. Authors of children’s books should de-emphasise heavy reliance of oral tradition and emphasise other aspects such as suitability and enjoyment so as to foster engagement and promote good reading culture among children.