What Is
A Book For?
41st
IBBY World
Congress
Reading The World
Through Children’s Eyes
Barcelona 2028
IBBY World Congress bring together writers, illustrators, publishers, reading promoters, booksellers, librarians, teachers, academics, researchers, students, organisations and institutions. The aim is to promote dialogue, advance knowledge, and reflect on the current and future challenges of reading.
· 4 days of congress
· 800 participants and speakers from across continents
· Over 100 sessions
· Hosting of the most important awards in children’s literature and reading promotion: Andersen, Asahi, Oustanding…
· Exhibitions and activities open to the public
The congress will focus on exploring and sharing the viewpoint and practice of children and young adults around reading as a critical, social and emancipatory cultural experience.
It is a political, cultural and profoundly contemporary one.
It means to ask what stories are shared and why, which are put aside, and who decides all this. It means to ask what place we give children in cultural life. It means to ask if literature can continue as a place for complexity against simplification, of coming together against fragmentation, and for imagination against cynicism. This congress does not seek a single answer. It invites a collective exploration.
Barcelona, a UNESCO City of Literature since 2015, has a long-standing tradition in publishing, literature and reading promotion. It will be much more than the Congress’s host city: it will be an integral part of the experience.
The main venue will be the Fabra i Coats cultural complex, though a city-wide programme of activities will take the Congress beyond this –making Barcelona itself the setting. The Congress will explore formats that go beyond the conventional conference model, combining a playful, festive, participatory and immersive experience, connected to Barcelona, while focusing on children’s voices and ways of seeing. Plenary sessions, talks and dialogues, workshops, storytelling, games, research presentations, events, ceremonies and festive gatherings will spur reflection, exchange and shared celebration.
