"Speak to Me in Capital Letters!" Same-sex Parenting, New Families and Homosexuality in Picturebooks Published by Lo Stampatello

The pioneering publishing house Lo Stampatello was established in 2011 with the ambitious aim of filling a vacuum in Italian books for children, namely the publication of books about same-sex families. Widening its original scope and focusing especially on the portrayal of families, Lo Stampatello publishes picturebooks dealing with homosexuality, same-sex parenting, single parenting, adoption and any different kind of family. By taking a close look at these picturebooks, I will explore how these fracturing themes are dealt with. After discussing the importance of gaysensitive books and the issues involved in their production, I will briefly outline the Italian socio-cultural context in relation to LGBTQ identities. In such a stifling and hostile context, Lo Stampatello as a publisher tries to make a difference and disrupt the status quo of Italian children’s book production. The analysis of Italian and translated picturebooks should therefore provide examples of the approaches used to achieve the publisher’s ambitious and disruptive aims.