BookCon 2015: Book Lovers Treated to Diverse Panels, Authors, and Speakers at Annual Conference

BookCon, the annual fan convention established in New York City in 2014, welcomed hundreds from the entertainment and book industries as well as tens of thousands of book lovers. The event offered attendees sprawling diversity during its second year.

#WeNeedDiverseBooks isn't just a demand from multicultural readers and authors; it's a flourishing campaign that rose from a panel discussion at BookCon 2014. Conversations about the lack of diversity in the publishing industry were had; yet, there was very little diversity at the exhibition itself. The organizers of BookCon jumped to correct the issue for the forthcoming BookCon, working with multicultural authors and experts to do so.

BookCon 2015 took place May 30 and 31, and it showcased dozens of diverse authors and speakers, and also presented several panels that directly addressed diversity in the publishing industry.

In attendance were Mindy Kaling, Aziz Ansari, Jacqueline Woodson, Aisha Saeed, Akilah Hughes, Cheryl Willis Hudson, Jason Reynolds, Jerdine Nolen, John Leguizamo, Ken Liu, Lauren Francis-Sharma, Maria Venegas, Marie Lu, Nicola Yoon, Rita Williams-Garcia, Shane W. Evans, Vanesse Lloyd-Sgambati, Meg Medina, Melissa de la Cruz, Daniel José Older and Nnedi Okorafor.

Also, the bevy of panels included John Leguizamo: Ghetto Klown, Mixed Me: A Discussion With Taye Diggs and Shane Evans, Telling Womens Stories, and We Need Diverse Books Presents Luminaries of Children's Literature.

We Need Diverse Books Presents In Our World and Beyond included Daniel José Older, Joe Monti, Kameron Hurley, Ken Liu, Marieke Nijkamp, Miranda Paul and Nnedi Okorafor. The renowned authors discussed marginalized characters, the prevalence of stereotyping, the promotion of diversity, the significance of representation, and so much more.

The panelists insisted that readers demand books that are not only good but books that actually reflect the reality that they live in. Abandoning the book shelves isn't the answer. Instead, readers should reach out to publishers putting books onto those shelves and push for them to address the problems. Also, authors can tackle the issue from the inside by proving to the gatekeepers that there are vital books that don't feature all white casts.

"For all of us who aren't a part of the majority in the U.S. we seem to have a double gaze, where we can, in fact, glance and see the world our own way, and we can also take on the view of the majority with fairly good accuracy -- far better than the other way around. It's worth thinking about how we achieve that. Why are we able to take on the white point of view so easily? Also, how do we manage to do it?" said Ken Liu, author of "The Grace of Kings."

"The way we're able to avoid stereotyping white ways of thinking is because we can embody that consciousness in a way that isn't seen as research or something exotic or strange. We're simply just trying to learn the way their world works.

"Think about what resources we use and what kind of things did we grew up doing. We relied on TV shows, we relied on pop culture to relay attitudes, which presented it and reinforced it. So, if you're trying to understand a different culture, don't encounter it as academic research. Go into it as if you're exhibiting and inhabiting that point of view, the way that we all learn."

Nnedi Okorafor, author of "The Book of Phoenix," shared an inexpensive and interesting way to learn more about a culture that isn't her own, and that's simply by visiting a restaurant. Okorafor sits at restaurants. She listens and eats the food, while taking in the aromas and observing interactions and conversations.

"Research is so huge, but research is only the beginning. You can't just go in as an academic, you're writing stories and you're writing people's lives. It's an emotion thing," advised Daniel José Older, author of the Bone Street Rumba urban fantasy series.

"Also, are you researching the history of stereotypes? Because that also gets left behind. There's a whole history of the western gaze and the male gaze. If you don't want to fall into stereotyping, you have to know what it is that you're writing."

According to Older, it's important that men challenge themselves to write themselves better, and white people learn to do the same, understanding how they function in the world, and how power functions around them. He also said the normalization of diversity began with writers of color taking risks, and that's not a history that we can't forget, ever.

"I think self-publishing is awesome, but it can't be the answer, its one answer," Older said.

"It's changed the game in a lot of ways, and it's shown publishers that there is power in people writing stories; but what can't happen is the decision to say, 'We'll just self-publish if the publishing industry isn't working out for me.' No, f*ck that. ... That's absolutely unacceptable. No shade to self-publishing, but that's an acceptable solution.

"That's as if to say, 'No, you can't live in our neighborhood, go live in that crappy little neighborhood.' Not that self-publishing is a crappy little neighborhood. ... But you know what I'm saying, you can't just regulate writing."

Learn more about BookCon, by visiting their website. Also, learn about #WeNeedDiverseBooks.