Department of English

Kenneth Kidd works in Anglophone children’s literature studies and is especially interested in the field’s intersections with other cultural projects, such as philosophy, psychology, and critical theory. His most recent book looks at children’s literature’s engagement with and presence inside theory and philosophy and is called Theory for Beginners: Children’s Literature as Critical Thought (Fordham, 2020). It’s a sequel of sorts to his second book, Freud in Oz (Minnesota, 2011), about the intersections of children’s literature and psychoanalysis. He is also interested in questions of gender and sexuality in and around children’s literature. His first book, Making American Boys (Minnesota, 2004), explores literary and cultural programs of “boyology” in relation to stories of boys raised by various animals (what he calls the “feral tale”). He has also coedited two essay collections dealing with queer childhood and/or children’s literature: Over the Rainbow (Michigan, 2004), and Queer as Camp: Essays in Summer, Style, and Sexuality (Fordham, 2019). He and Derritt also co-edited Alt Kid Lit: What Children’s Literature Might Be (Mississippi, 2024), which continues his interest in expanding what registers as children’s literature. With UF colleague Sid Dobrin he also coedited the first essay collection on children’s literature and ecocriticism, Wild Things (Wayne State, 2004), and with Joseph T. Thomas, Jr. he coedited Prizing Children’s Literature: The Cultural Politics of Children’s Book Awards (Routledge, 2017). Kenneth is currently working on a book about Florida children’s literature.

Professor Kidd serves on a number of editorial boards and is especially active with the Children’s Literature Association. He is coeditor of the third volume of the Cambridge History of Children’s Literature, now in preparation, and with Elizabeth Marshall he co-edits the Children’s Literature and Culture series at Routledge, the oldest-running monograph series in the field. Professor Kidd teaches undergraduate courses in children’s and young adult literature, including a new course on Florida children’s literature, as well as graduate seminars such as “Into the Archive,” “Comparative Children’s Literature” and “Disney and Its Discontents.” He is an Affiliate Professor with the Center for Women’s Studies and Gender Research and also serves as Director of UF’s Center for the Study of Children’s Literature & Culture. He was named a UF Research Foundation Professor for 2024-2027.