Notice Regarding Twitter Hashtag #ChYALit

The ChLA Membership Committee is working to address the needs of members on Twitter interested in the broad academic study of children's and young adult literature.

As part of this ongoing exploration of social networking, the committee recently solicited suggestions via the @chlatweets account for a common hashtag: one more specific and helpful to an academic focus than the popular #kidlit and #yalit tags already in use. Hashtags are an effective way to consolidate a community around a particular conversation topic; those interested in the topic can search the hashtag and locate Twitter users they might not otherwise know who are similarly interested. While there have been ChLA hashtags in the past, they have always been conference-specific or organization-specific (e.g. #ChLA15 or #ChLA) and therefore limited in scope and effectiveness.

Based on a two-day survey and sixty votes received from participants, the Membership Committee and ChLA recommend #ChYALit for ChLA members on Twitter to use when discussing the academic study of children's and young adult literature. The committee hopes that the use of this hashtag will further enable ChLA members to stay in conversation with one another between the annual conferences.

If you're on twitter, please consider using the #ChYALit tag, and help us to spread the word!