In an effort to examine, understand and bring to light the unique challenges Caribbean children's and young adult writers face in getting their work published (either traditionally or self-published), we created The Caribbean Children's and YA Writers Survey. This anonymous questionnaire is for Caribbean writers for young audiences. It doesn't matter if you haven't yet published a book; as long as you're writing for young audiences and identify as a person of Caribbean heritage/ancestry, we want to hear from you.
Click here for a direct link to the survey, or you can fill it out right here on our site by scrolling down to the end of this page. The survey closes on April 30th, 2019.
In private circles, in one-off conversations, our writers tell countless stories of the unique challenges they face trying to break into publishing, but their experiences have not yet been collectively publicized. This has led to a culture of silence surrounding the exclusion of Caribbean narratives in children's/YA publishing. We aim to disrupt this culture of silence and widen the window of discourse. We seek to document as much as possible the range of experiences and views of Caribbean writers for young audiences who have been trying to get their work published—some of them for decades—as well as those who have already published a book.
The information collected via this questionnaire will be made available to publishers and literary agencies (both in the Caribbean and elsewhere) who express interest in acquiring work by, and successfully working with, Caribbean children's and young adult writers. We will also report our findings on our website. We will use this information to characterize the particular struggles Caribbean children's and young adult writers face in selling and translating their work to publishing houses, literary agents and editors in the publishing establishment (in the USA, UK etc.).
We hope that responses to the questionnaire will open up conversations about what is needed to make the children's/YA publishing industry more receptive to Caribbean voices, stories, and ways of telling them. Your participation is greatly appreciated and will make an important contribution to the industry. Completing this survey should take approximately 15-30 mins. Thanks for your participation and please share this widely!
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Very cool. Can't wait to see the results of this survey.
ReplyDeleteThis is a useful initiative. Looking forward to the results.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the vote of confidence Carol!
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