Picture Books across Cultures: A Leap into the Unknown?

Often, when one is immersed in one's own culture and literature it is very difficult to make a leap into the unknown and explore the excitement that is to be found in children's literature around the world. IBBY is a fantastic ambassador for this, but there have been other wheels in motion to help children worldwide to learn more about each other through children's literature, especially picture books. I have been very fortunate to have worked with the most amazing colleagues over the last 20 years, particularly in Europe, and together we have created a number of exciting projects that have helped children to understand each other through reading the visual narratives of carefully selected picture books. This column is designed to provide a number of practical suggestions that might tempt teachers to use more books from a variety of cultures. It will discuss a few of the aforementioned projects, suggest some suitable classroom activities, and conclude by proposing a possible way forward.

Selected Projects

Some of the projects, which show how carefully selected visual narratives and translations can help young people from different cultures to understand more about each other, are quite well known. The European Picture Book Collection, which was created in 1996 when there were only 15 countries in the European Union, is one of these; and ESET, an on-line teacher-training course for use with the EPBC books, is another. Further projects, such as BARFIE (Books and Reading for Intercultural Education) and ED M Reporter have had less exposure but are equally important in the quest for cultural understanding. The most recent project, EPBC II is a rejuvenation of the first EPBC and incorporates a wide range of picture books from all 27 EU member states. It draws on the work of its predecessors but covers new ground in terms of breaking formal boundaries, using electronic narratives and challenging traditions and taboos.

Based on the concept of the EPBC, a further picture book collection was created in New Zealand in 2010. The purpose of the NZPBC (He Kohinga Pukapuka Pikitia o Aotearoa) is to provide a set of quality New Zealand English picture books reflecting diversity in New Zealand society with specially designed, curriculum-linked classroom activities. Many of the books selected have been translated from the Maori language into English.

There are a number of other ventures that are beginning to cross boundaries and allow rare insights into other cultures through facilitating translations from many lesser-known languages into English, as well as using the visual narratives to convey cross-cultural meanings. One of these is Outside-In, an organisation set up to promote, explore and celebrate world literature and particularly children's books in translation. Its main aims are to encourage the introduction of more world literature into the UK and help children and adults to explore and enjoy international children's books. Outside In finds the most exciting books from all over the world and makes them available to English speaking audiences, enabling children to broaden their reading experiences and explore different cultures through books.

Another venture now bearing fruit is the Marsh Children's Literature in Translation Award, which has been awarded biennially since 1996. It was founded to celebrate the best translation of a children's book from a foreign language into English and published in the UK. The Marsh award aims to spotlight the high quality and diversity of translated fiction for young readers and seeks to address a situation in the UK in which less than 3% of work published for children and young people has been from the non-English speaking world. Both these ventures are making inter-cultural exchanges possible and allowing young people to have access to literature from many cultures which, hitherto, were inaccessible.

Practical Insights

Six of the following eight websites provide examples of good visual narratives that help to convey the similarities and differences that exist between cultures. They are accompanied by selected practical activities, which can be adapted for intercultural use with books in any language...