Focus IBBY

IBBY Regional Meetings

The IBBY cycle is a two-year cycle—the Andersen Awards, the IBBY Honour List, and the world congress in an even year; and the IBBY outstanding selection of books for young people with disabilities, the Silent Books selection, and the regional congresses in the uneven year. The 2017 Regional Meetings began with congresses in Bologna for Europe, Bangkok for the Asia and Oceania region, and in Buenos Aires for the Latin American sections.

The 1st European Regional Conference was organized jointly by several sections in Europe and took the form of a one-day conference in connection with the Bologna Children’s Book Fair on Thursday, 6 April 2017. The theme—Bridging Worlds: Reaching out to Young Refugees with Books and Stories—continues to be very relevant in Europe, both currently and historically. The conference opened with a welcome by Franco Boni, the President of the Bologna Fiere. Then IBBY President, Wally De Doncker, spoke to the theme of the conference by saying, “If you want to welcome refugee children in a friendly way, you have to start with the children of the communities. People can only live in harmony when both sides understand that refugees arrive because they are victims of a terrible situation in their home country and have little choice. Refugee children and the children in the community can learn empathy through books and activities related to books, and a library or reading room can be an excellent opportunity to get to know one another in a neutral environment.” Joseph Nhan O’Reilly, Head of the Education Policy and Advocacy for Save the Children UK, set the scene by giving perspectives on the current refugee situation. UK member Ann Lazim reported that amongst the statistics he presented was the fact that over half of the world’s refugees are children, and 6.7 million are of school age; not only that, it is poorer countries that are receiving the largest number of refugees. The average time for displacement of a refugee from their country of origin is twenty-seven years.

Other presentations were grouped by topic. The session on supporting young refugees with reading and book projects included the Book Pirates by Martin Gries (Germany); the Vooelees Express Reading project by Marloes Robijn (Netherlands); Eux, c’est nous, which is a book about refugees that has been produced as a joint initiative by forty French children’s publishers, presented by Sophie Giraud and Laurence Faron (France); and two authors gave accounts of their writing for refugees, Laila Koubaa (Belgium) and Neli Kodrič Filipič (Slovenia). With plenty of time for comments and discussions, the conference went on to talk about how to support young refugees through libraries. This section included a talk by Jochen Weber about the International Youth Library, Bibliothèques sans Frontières by Muy-Cheng Peich, and the response of the public library in Calais, France by Bénédicte Frocaut. After lunch, Mariella Berelli (Canada) led story time and then introduced the Silent Books project. Deborah Soria (Italy) introduced the IBBY Project Silent Books: Final Destination Lampedusa. The project has also been instigated in Sweden by IBBY Sweden, and Cay Corneliuson gave a presentation about what they are doing in Sweden. Helen Limon (UK) gave a moving account of her experiences during the 2016 Lampedusa camp as a volunteer. Hasmig Chahinian (France) and Eva Devos (Belgium) gave the audience a description and invitation to explore the IBBY Europe Tool Kit that is featured on the IBBY Europe website. A round-up discussion explored ways the IBBY European sections could move forward with a stronger network, sharing information and resources. See more at www.ibby-europe.org, www.facebook.com/IBBY.Europe/

Somboon Singkamanan talking about going back to the roots of children’s literature and learning to uproot.

Mingzhou Zhang announcing the 4th Asia and Oceania Regional IBBY Congress in 2019.

In May, ThaiBBY were the hosts and organizers of the 3rd Asia and Oceania Regional IBBY Congress (AORIC). The congress was held in Bangkok...