On November 3rd, the 12th annual Multicultural Children’s Book Festival was held at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, USA. Over 7,000 people attended this free event and enjoyed an afternoon filled with authors’ readings & signings (more than 400 titles were available for purchase); illustrators and celebrities’ appearances; interactive performances, and more.
The Multicultural Children’s Book Festival originally began as a collaboration between the Kennedy Center and Black Books Galore!, a children’s book service created in 1992 by three African American mothers who were frustrated by the lack of children’s books portraying African American themes. Now produced by the Kennedy Center, the festival has grown to include books and authors representing a wide array of cultures and experiences from throughout the world, including Asian and Latino in all their rich shades.
One of this year’s featured guests was award winning author Mitali Perkins, a regularly featured author and contributor to the PaperTigers website (she was the first author to participate, along with her mother, in our Community Outreach project!). We asked Mitali to share something about her experience of attending the book festival, and here is what she wrote us:
“Okay, I confess: I haven’t been doing well with the label “multicultural.” (more…)