The public schools in her community were not racially segregated, though Bishop noted that professional opportunities were limited for African Americans at the time.
The first influence came when one of her freshman college roommates, Patricia Grasty Gaines, introduced her to Marguerite de Angeli's Bright April (1946), the first children's book Bishop read with characters that looked and experienced community life similar to her own.
I remember wanting to read them all, see what they were like, what sorts of topics and themes were dealt with, and how African Americans were represented.
That was one of the threads that eventually led to my interest in multicultural literature..."[4] The final influence came from Bishop's work as a graduate research assistant to Wayne State professor Ken Goodman, who was also her advisor.
[4] The research recorded children in states as diverse as Mississippi, Maine and Hawaii reading two different stories, including one identified as "culturally relevant".
"[4] Bishop's 1982 book, Shadow and Substance, established a framework for analyzing children's literature about people of color, and remains a standard in the field.
[4] In 2013, Rudine Sims Bishop received the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) James R. Squire award.