2021 Diversity Reading Challenge

Posted November 27, 2020 by lenoreo in 2021 Diversity Reading Challenge / 26 Comments

We’re back for another year! This challenge is focused on intentionally reading more diverse books, whether it be diverse characters or diverse authors. We’ve been hosting it since 2019, when we merged some concepts from the Platypire Diversity Challenge and the 2017 Diverse Reads Book Challenge hosted by Chasing Faerytales and Read.Sleep.Repeat. There’s the basic challenge of reading as many diverse books as you can, with the added monthly theme mini-challenge, where you can get bonus points for reading towards a theme each month (and by bonus points, we really just mean bragging rights). It’s a way to challenge yourself, but still reward yourself for just reading diversely altogether. UPDATE: Bingo Card added on April 1st, see below.

January to March Link-Up
April to June Link-Up
July to September Link-Up
October to December Link-Up

How do we classify a book as diverse?

The author or the main character – or one of the leads, who preferably has a POV – has to belong to a diverse group. According to the definition of We Need Diverse Books:

“We recognize all diverse experiences, including (but not limited to) LGBTQIA, Native, people of color, gender diversity, people with disabilities*, and ethnic, cultural, and religious minorities.

*We subscribe to a broad definition of disability, which includes but is not limited to physical, sensory, cognitive, intellectual, or developmental disabilities, chronic conditions, and mental illnesses (this may also include addiction). Furthermore, we subscribe to a social model of disability, which presents disability as created by barriers in the social environment, due to lack of equal access, stereotyping, and other forms of marginalization.”

Guidelines:

While we’re pretty lax about how you wish to set up this challenge for yourself, we do have a few guidelines to follow.

The challenge will run from January 1st, 2021 to December 31st, 2021. Books must be read during this time frame to count. Sign up is open from now until December 1st, 2021, so you may join even just for the last month of the year.
Any format and length of book counts – print, ebook, audio, ARC, etc.
Crossovers from other challenges are totally acceptable!
Reviews are not required, but highly encouraged.

How to Play:

Declare your intentions to participate in this challenge somewhere on the internet!! You do not need to be a blogger to participate, there are many ways to declare. You could write a blog post, create a reading challenge page, create a Goodreads shelf containing diverse books you hope to read, post about it on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.
Some things you could include (but that aren’t required):
- A link to this page so that others may find us and join the fun as well (feel free to download the button at the bottom to use in your posts).
- The goals you are setting for yourself (number of diverse books you want to read over the year, number of different kinds of diversity you want to explore, and if participating in the mini-challenge, the level you are aiming for).
- A list of potential diverse books you hope to read for this challenge.
Sign up for the challenge using the link up below, and link directly to where you’ve declared your intentions (ie to the specific blog post, the goodreads shelf, the facebook post, etc).
We will be posting quarterly link ups for you to add links to your reviews or any wrap-up/overview posts you wish to share.
Go forth and READ!! And have fun!!
Use the hashtag #DiversityRC2021 on any social media to keep up with other participants!

Mini-Challenge (optional):

For those who want to challenge themselves even more, each month has a theme to read towards. These themes will help you tackle the different kinds of diversity. On occasion we’ve given multiple themes in a month to give readers options (ie I had a lot of great choices, and I couldn’t decide).

JANUARY – diverse folktales/culture/mythology; or diverse retelling; or non-western setting
FEBRUARY – poc: Black/African American
MARCH – #ownvoices; or gender: female authors in male-dominated genres/non-fiction
APRIL – poc: Middle Eastern/South Asian
MAY – poc: East Asian/Southeast Asian/Pacific Islander
JUNE – LGBT+ pride summer: sexuality and gender identity
JULY – LGBT+ pride summer: sexuality and gender identity
AUGUST – mental health/addiction
SEPTEMBER – poc: hispanic/latinx
OCTOBER – physical/sensory/cognitive/intellectual/developmental disabilities
NOVEMBER – poc: Native American
DECEMBER – religious minorities

There’s sort of an extra level to the LGBT+ pride summer in June and July — aim to check off as many letters in LGBTQQIA (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex and asexual) as possible!

Mini-Challenge Reward:

Uh…your own sense of pride in achieving a goal? We can offer you some pretty graphics to either declare your goal or to use as a badge once achieved.

Mini-Challenge Levels:

We offer you 3 different levels of achievement for the mini-challenge:

Noice Level ⇒ Participate in 1-4 monthly themes.

Da Bomb Level ⇒ Participate in 5-8 monthly themes.

Ermahgerd Level ⇒ Participate in 9-12 monthly themes.

Bingo Card (optional):

I had quite a few people indicate they wanted an alternative to the optional monthly theme (as a way to count the different kinds of diversity you’re reading without it being tied to a particular time frame). I’ve enjoyed bingo cards in other challenges, so I thought I would try that. As with the mini-challenge, this is optional — just a fun way to try to challenge yourself. The only rule is a book can only be used in 1 square. (SIDE NOTE: I had a hell of a time trying to figure out what are the differences between developmental, intellectual, and cognitive disabilities — and I don’t think I came up with a consistent answer. I picked two of the 3, but I am not an authority over any of that, so…just be kind to me, okay? I’m starting to think I picked the wrong two, so feel free to cross out one and replace)