Research Focus Group Talk: The Child Labor Issue as Depicted in the TV Cartoon Meena Ki Kahani

In this talk, Dr. Jawa Jha focuses on child labor, particularly the issues faced by the girl child as depicted in the TV cartoon series Meena Ki Kahani (Stories of Meena), broadcast in India. This presentation is divided broadly into three main sections. The first section provides a brief overview of India’s children literature, tracing its transition from oral storytelling traditions to visual media like cartoon-based TV shows. The second section examines child labor issues depicted in Meena Ki Kahani. This TV cartoon series, produced with the support of UNICEF, aims to raise awareness about various social inequalities prevalent in South Asian countries. Re-telecast in India on the Doordarshan channel for e-learning during the pandemic lockdown, Meena Ki Kahani aims at reducing child labor along with other social issues. The last section of the presentation attempts to comprehend the problems of child labor faced by a girl child in India’s socio-cultural context. This presentation seeks to amplify awareness in order to stop the vicious cycle of child labor in India.

Dr. Jawa Jha is the first Indian to complete a Ph.D. in Korean Literature from Seoul National University, South Korea. She has taught as Guest faculty at Jawaharlal Nehru University and Bangalore City University, India. She co-authored a book on Elementary Hindi for Korean learners, published in 2020 by Busan University of Foreign Studies. She was awarded various research grants and scholarships, including the Academy of Korean Studies Research Fellowship, Silk-Road Scholarship, and Korea Foundation’s Korean language learning scholarship. Recently, she was invited as a speaker at the 2024 World Bang Jung Hwan Conference on Children’s Literature held in Suwon, Korea.

Zoom attendance link here

Sponsored by the IHC’s Global Childhood Media Research Focus Group