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This book examines how girl characters are portrayed in children´s books by writers from the majorly patriarchal setups. The book further makes a deliberate attempt to compare the girl character in the books and the girl child in a patriarchal African society. The work is the outcome of intensive interaction with girl children in typical patriarchal settings and an analysis of selected children´s books by leading Kenyan writers. As one reads through this book, one keeps confronting the ever recurring question of whether the social and gender disparities between men and women are a natural phenomenon or simply a social construct. It also provides some of the answers to some of the questions raised in Images of Women in African Oral Literature, a book by the same author. The book is recommended for scholars, students and researchers in literature and linguistics and social and cultural studies at all levels of scholastic pursuits. The book is also hoped to greatly benefit researchers and students in gender and women studies as we venture into the question of how the adult woman is constructed.

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Joseph Muleka, PhD (University of Nairobi), lectures in the Department of Literature, University of Nairobi, Kenya. He is an author, educator, musician, critic and literary scholar. He also holds a certificate in teaching (Mosoriot College), Dip, Ed (Kagumo), B.Ed (Catholic University) and MA (Kenyatta University).

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