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A Comparative Study of Fatherhood Construction in Chinese and English Children's Picture Books from the Perspective of Visual Narrative

Wen Li, Yanli Xu

Abstract


In the social media era, children's picture books serve as key multimodal carriers for cognitive development. Research often focuses
on foreign works, while original Chinese picture books face issues of imitation and cultural limitations, and comparative studies on fatherhood construction remain scarce. Grounded in visual narrative and identity discourse theory, this study compares The Dark Blue Bird Is My
Dad and My Dad using mixed methods with NVivo 12. It examines interpersonal meaning construction, fatherhood types, and cultural value
mechanisms. Findings show both Chinese and English picture books emphasise the three interpersonal meaning systems, with interactive
fatherhood dominant. However, Chinese books favour a subjective perspective, protective interactive identity, and implicit emotion, while
English books prefer an objective perspective, authoritative interactive identity, and direct emotion. These differences stem from collectivism
versus individualism. The study offers a reference for domestic picture book research and creation.

Keywords


Children's picture books; Fatherhood construction; Visual narrative; Cross-cultural comparison; Interpersonal meaning

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References


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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.70711/rcha.v4i4.9567

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