The examination of the multicultural elements in the stories and novels of Mavisel Yener

This study includes the analysis on stories and novels of Mavisel Yener, a children's literature author, on a multicultural basis. In the context of this study 28 stories and novels of the author's books which are published by various publishers have been analysed by using content analysis adhering to qualitative research methods. At first, a theoretical framework has been formed on the subject headings of multiculturalism, multicultural education, children's literature and multicultural children's literature on the scope of this study. Then, after giving a short biography about Mavisel Yener, information is stated about the previous scientific researches and publications on study context of field literature. In this study, the stories and the novels of Mavisel Yener are evaluated in five various upper themes on the basis of multiculturalism. These upper themes are defined as "Ethnical Elements" (later separated into subthemes of race/foreign language, religion, gender, common humanity ideals.), "Disadvantageous Groups" (later separated into subthemes of being disabled, woman, child, adult, with a low status, individual differences, physical differences.), "Cultural Values" (later separated into subthemes of cuisine culture, historical and cultural values, dominating universal culture.), "Respect to Other Creatures" (later separated into subthemes of love of nature and animal) and "Communication" (later evaluated within the communication between child-adult.) The books analyzed within this study have been read twice and then messages of the themes in question are coded. In order to ensure the reliability and validity of the detected messages, the similarity rate of the codes between two different encoders' and the researchers has been calculated and reliability rate has been ensured by applying the formula of common consensus of encoders known as intrinsic consistency in Miles and Huberman model. In the light of the findings acquired, it has been detected that the stories and novels of Mavisel Yener include multicultural elements, and the messages found in the author's books are structured in such a way that they can stimulate positive thoughts about the differences in the world of the child. In the light of top themes, it has been found that there are generally positive messages on different race, language, religion and gender in the author's usage of ethnic elements. It has also been detected in her books that the author mentions the difficulties that disadvantaged groups experience; that she warns children about the risk of erosion of historical and cultural values, uses statements that respect everything besides human; also it is seen that she points the right and wrong attitudes while communicating with a child both to the parents and educators. Moreover, it is detected that the books analyzed have been devoted to age groups as the target group by adhering to the author's official website; the number of the messages on multiculturalism are less for the age group of 9-11, are more in the books for the age group of 11-13 and over 13 and thus the number of the messages gradually increase. As a result, it has been detected that the texts in the stories and novels of Mavisel Yener's books can be suitable education-teaching materials for these purposes in the selection of the texts and books that can be recommended to the children to reinforce respect to differences in Turkish education and desire of living together in a multicultural environment. Key Words: Turkish education, children's literature, multiculturalism, multicultural education, multicultural children's literature.