CBCP x CeLM x OIW Webinar: Nicola Daly, Indigenous Voices in Aotearoa New Zealand children’s picturebooks

I am delighted to cohost this webinar, part of the ‘Explorations in Translation for Children’ series co-organised by The Centre for Book Cultures and Publishing at the University of Reading, England, in partnership with Outside in World, the organisation dedicated to exploring and promoting children’s books in translation. Exceptionally for this webinar we are also pleased to partner with the Centre for Literacy & Multilingualism.

On Wednesday 18th November at 12-1pm (UK time)/ 10pm (Melbourne time) we will be welcoming Nicola Daly of University of Waikato, New Zealand, who will be speaking on ‘Indigenous Voices in Aotearoa New Zealand children’s picturebooks’

Register to join this event online for free here. 

Presenter: Nicola Daly  Authors: Nicola Daly, Eboni Waitere, Julie Barbour, Darryn Joseph, Te Kani Price, Pania Tahau-Hodges, Kawata Teepa, Nic Vanderschantz, Bryony Walker

Indigenous storytelling has often been marginalised in children’s publishing with many stories retold and published by authors and publishing houses outside Indigenous communities (Scaletti et al., 2025).  In the last decade there has been an increase in the number of Indigenous owned and/or led publishing houses which is essential for the creation of children’s books sharing authentic Indigenous voices (Encisco, Wolf, Coates & Jenkins, 2020). Research in the area of Indigenous children’s literature publishing is limited but growing (Scaletti et al., 2025; Sheehan-Bright, 2010; Bradford, 2007; Stagg-Peterson & Robinson, 2020), and findings indicate the importance of commitment to storytelling, collaboration and education; the amplification of Indigenous languages, the place of external funding and the educational background of authors and illustrators. The overarching aim of our research on picturebooks in Aotearoa New Zealand is to document and explore the ways in which Indigenous voices are and can be authentically represented, through a close collaboration with Huia Publishers, an Indigenous publisher; in a sense we are working to document and understand the ways in which this successful award-winning publisher is both Indigenising and simultaneously decolonising picturebook publishing in Aotearoa. Our work is developing understandings of the process of Indigenous children’s picturebook publishing, identifying key principles underpinning the decision making which leads to their publication. Using research conversations, reflections and field notes with key participants in the publishing process we explore decolonising approaches in terms of who writes and illustrates picturebooks, the cultural content of the picturebooks, and the languages used in their texts. This research contributes to our understanding of the successful Indigenous publishing of picturebooks.