Arts Council England confirms next stage of Reflecting Disability project

Arts Council England has confirmed funding for the next stage of the Reflecting Disability project, to explore the representation of disabled people in children’s books. 

Led by disabled people, Reflecting Disability was established last year to build a comprehensive framework through which to consider books for children aged three to 11 and support publishers and creators in the representation of disabled realities. 

An accompanying website has launched to outline more details of the project including the call for submissions. Then all books that fit the criteria will be studied for the type and quality of representation. This will provide a comprehensive set of data for books published in 2024 that can be analysed for a report. 

As well as inviting all publishers to submit eligible titles, the project will also offer the book creators themselves the option to share any experience or research that influenced the book.

Author and steering group member Lisette Auton revealed her experiences in a comment piece for The Bookseller, writing: "Just as disabled people are not homogenous (although that is called into question every time the term ‘the disabled’ is used), neither are our views about how much of ourselves we want to share and who gets to tell stories."

Organisers said: "The steering group felt strongly that it would be hugely helpful to know how lived experience and research influences quality of representation. However, they are only too aware that there’s often an expectation that disabled people share personal medical information when this wouldn’t be expected of non-disabled people. By giving book creators the choice to share or not, it’s hoped that the report can start to explore this area, with the acknowledgement that any insights will be anecdotal."

Phase three of the project, to be funded in the future, will involve analysing the data and producing a report, with an aim for publication late 2025. Organisers said: “The vision is that this project (‘Reflecting Disability: Representation of Disabled People in UK Children’s Books’) will develop into an annual survey to report on the quantity and quality of representation of disabled people in children’s literature in the UK, similar to the Reflecting Realities survey and report of representation of ethnic diversity.” 

This new activity follows the initial phase of this project, which established a steering group of people with lived experience of disability and neurodivergence.  

Shannon Cullen, publishing director of Walker Books, called it “an urgent piece of work for the publishing community to better understand the representation of disability and neurodivergence in our children’s books and creative talent”.  

She said of the preparatory phase: “The development process and consultations across the advisory teams and the steering group, with the aim being to get the most meaningful data, have been rigorous in their approach and insight. That process alone has proven the need for us to be having more open and nuanced discussions." 

Dr Fen Coles, director of Letterbox Library and coordinator of the Little Rebels Award, said: “There is a real need and hunger for high quality, thoughtful representations of disabled and neurodivergent people in children’s books. While publishers have taken some truly positive steps to meet this, we still desperately need more representation and we need these to be fully diverse: in terms of intersectionality, in terms of the range of conditions portrayed and in terms of the space these portrayals take up in the text.” 

Visit reflectingdisability.co.uk to contribute, or for more information.