***Planning for 2013: What Should Our Themes Be?

In the the thread on making theme reads even better in 2013, there weren't a lot of suggestions, so I think we should more or less follow what we did this year. Here are the conclusions we came to last year, with some annotations (in italics).

1. We should continue having four quarterly theme reads in 2012, possibly with a year-long theme too.
2. We should try to narrow the focus of each read, e.g., Regions in Conflict - Africa or Regions in Conflict -20th Century, rather than just Regions in Conflict. One poster thought we did better when we focused specifically on a region.
3. We should encourage theme read leaders to pick 3-5 recommended reads offering differing perspectives on the theme, preferably some of which the leader will read himself or herself. Participants interested in being able to discuss specific books with others could then choose from among these recommended reads, but everyone would be able to read any book that fits the theme. The theme read leaders did this, but I'm not sure how well the following along worked.
4. We should encourage people to discuss the books they read in the context of the theme rather than simply posting reviews. The perennial problem! One suggestion was for a separate discussion thread.

Now that it's November, it's time to start suggesting topics for our 2013 theme reads, paying attention to point 2 above. Now's the time to come up with all the ideas you have; we'll winnow them down later. Specifically, let's plan on spending the next two weeks or so suggesting ideas. Then I'll run a poll like I did for the past two years so we can vote on the ideas we like in the last two weeks of the month, so that by early December we'll know what the themes will be next year and who will be running each of them.

Thanks to everyone who participated this year, especially the theme read leaders and the people who took the time to think about how to improve the reads for next years.

Let's all come up with some great ideas and have another great year of Reading Globally!

I definitely agree with the annotation to #2. A bit more focus limits the huge amount of options to something more reasonable to choose between, and helps people to likely read things more similar in nature, thus furthering discussion ability and just making it more cohesive. Separate discussion threads also sound like a good idea.

ETA: Being a n00b to the group I feel weird suggesting themes. However, I do plan on doing some African-oriented reading this coming year, so if that were somehow included I'd certainly play along there! ;)

Another newbie here. THis year I found that I got a lot out of concentrating on one country at a time; so a narrower focus would work for me.

I wonder if there is a different way to incorporate non-fiction into the themes. Just an idea.

#2 I am definitely interested on more African reading.

One of the suggestions that was mentioned over the course of the year was to to do a Northern Africa theme read, i.e., countries that were left out of the Middle Eastern theme read, such as Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, and maybe the next level south like Mali, Sudan, etc.

Personally, that's kind of the area I'm least interested in. The "next level south" (and everywhere else) I'd do, but the "not quite Middle East" just isn't what I'm looking for. I'd just go ahead on my own if that's what y'all picked though, not a problem.

I am also interested in sub-saharan Africa. I was wanting to try Ngugi wa Thiong'o and also have several Nigerian authors I would like to read.

But I think I also have some Algerian, Libyan and Moroccon books on my wish list.

#5, 6 That's why we'll have a vote when more people suggest more themes! I don't think you were either here for the vote last year, but you can look at this thread to see how it worked.

Yeah like I said, I'm new! :P I like joining up in different groups to expand my horizons, but often don't wind up reading the things going on in them at the same time, due to the expense of books, my already full shelves (lol), and my non-English library. So I will of course watch & wait & try to join in the fun, but if it turns out I go other directions than the themes of the year wind up being, it's still all good. :)

Couple of regional suggestions, which I've picked because they are a little bit 'off the beaten shelf' - although the downside of this is that they might be harder to get hold of:

- southeast Asia (essentially, 'Asia IV' although I would also include the Philippines in this)

- literature from India or South Asia, NOT originally written in English

And thematically, I'd be interested in something around genre fiction from around the world, or if we wanted to narrow it down to a region I'd say Asia (lots of Japanese crime, fantasy, sci-fi, Chinese martial arts novels, etc). (I did have some more serious suggestions but realised they'd already been done - conflict and post-conflict, and immigration).

Thanks, wandering_star! As for the "serious" suggestions, it's not so much that they've already "been done," as there are so many books that fit those themes, but that they're so broad. I think it would be possible to consider them if you narrowed them down, for example in the ways suggested in point 2 in my original post. I had been mulling over themes of colonialism/postcolonialism and racism, but they would also have to either be narrowed down by region or time period or perhaps used as a year-long "lens" for looking at our reading.

Has the group ever done a 'banned books' theme?

Rebecca, thanks for the link! It looks like a great process--very comprehensive.

I was thinking of doing a personal focus on the British Empire; which might fit together with your ideas about colonialism and post-colonialism. But I haven't gotten so far as to figure out how to organize it.

I'd second a nomination for 'the British Empire', it's potentially a very interesting and broad subject. Perhaps others might find it a little too broad though, so maybe there's an angle which could be introduced to make it more focused in a certain direction?

I'd be interested in a sub-Saharan Africa theme, and also in north Africa.

I'm planning to focus on Ireland this year for one of my personal categories, and so will throw that out there too.

I like the colonialism/post-colonialism theme and also the British empire. It seems to me that either could be an overarching theme applied to various regions throughout the year.

Banned books from different areas each quarter sounds like a good theme.

With regard to the idea of colonialism and post colonialism, that is such a huge topic that perhaps following conclusion 2 in the first post, if that theme was to be chosen, it could be done in one area such as Africa, with quarterly themes highlighting individual European powers as colonizers, so for instance you could have German, French, Portuguese and so on.

I really appreciated the work by the various quarterly leaders this year as suggestions for reading.

My own suggestions for areas of interest would be South America or southeast Asia. I'm really sorry I wasn't part of this group when it did The Sea, but again, the thread gave me lots of ideas for reading.

I haven't done so well in this group this year but like the sound of wandering_star's suggestion of genre.

My idea would be to focus on a region and maybe trying for something along the lines of one or two of the following: debut novels, books published since 2000, emerging young writers, magical realism, biographical fiction, surrealism, retellings of mythology or folktales, national/regional award winners/longlists etc .

Some great ideas here! Keep them coming!

#14 Anne DC If we were to do sub-Saharan Africa, that's still a big area and a lot of different countries. On the Reading Globally group page, you'll see Africa broken down into several sub-regions. Are there one or more that particularly intrigue you?

#15 Sassy Ditto for South America. Would you want to break that down in some way?

#16 avatiakh I'm not quite sure I understand what you are suggesting. Do you mean that when we focus on a region, we should also focus on one or more of the types of fiction you are suggesting, or do you mean that one or more of those types of fiction should be the focus of a quarterly theme read?

There are several themes that would work within the context of South America, some of them already mentioned:
- magic realism
- colonialism and liberation
- oppression and incarceration
- crime novels
- mythology and folklore
- award winners
- nineteenth century writers
- indigenous peoples, peasants

Some of these themes also lend themselves well to nonfiction for those who are interested in background reading.

It might also be interested to see if there were differences in treatment of the same theme between those books in written in Spanish and those written in Portuguese for example.

If there are works in indigenous languages available in translation, I would be interested in those as well. I'm sure given this group that someone will have some knowledge of this!

Hope this helps

I was suggesting these types of fiction choices as ideas for the quarterly theme reads. The region idea was just to narrow the focus as suggested at the top of the thread.

Looking back at last year's voting thread, I noticed that in most cases we wound up combining similar topics into larger ones after the voting. If we can find an alternative to doing that this year, then maybe we won't have the problem of topics so broad that we are rarely reading the same books. It also suggests, though, that we shouldn't shy away from nominating very narrow topics, as the group leader always has the option of merging them with something else if she thinks they are too limited.

Personally, I prefer narrowing topics geographically rather than by theme or genre, as this makes it easy to get a handle on the scope while allowing those who prefer, say, non-fiction or mysteries to participate. So, rather than an entire region, we could do part of a region, a single country, or even a single city.

I like the idea of North Africa. Since we just did Egypt as part of the Middle East, I would suggest limiting it to: Libya, Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco.

I also like the suggestion that we do something in sub-Saharan Africa, but that's a huge area, and restricting it to the topic of "Colonialism" doesn't limit it all that much, since that's the dominant theme in African literature. So my nomination is a single country: South Africa. It has a diverse and thriving literature and represents the opposite end of the continent from any North African reading we do.

Latin America is certainly due for a visit. I think we should save Brazil for next year when they host the World Cup, so I am nominating: Mexico.

Lastly, it seems that much of our reading has been centered on areas with a recent history of strife, impoverishment, or oppression. It would be nice for a change to visit a country enjoying peace, prosperity and freedom, but with its own language and long literary tradition: Sweden.

Thanks for the suggestions, Steven. Do you think there would be enough books to choose from if we were to pick single countries? Well, I guess you do, or you wouldn't have suggested it! I'm wondering, though, whether your suggestions might be be broadened slightly -- maybe not for South Africa, although I'm sure we could include a few neighboring countries, but maybe Scandinavia instead of just Sweden, or Mexico and Central America instead of just Mexico. Great idea about visiting countries that are currently peaceful, prosperous, and free!

#21 - Well, I thought the point of conclusion #2 in the first message above was that our themes had been too broad, and that there were so many books to pick from in regions such as the Balkans and the Middle East that we were seldom crossing paths. That's why I proposed single countries or smaller groups of countries.

Another quick idea - graphic novels?

I like Steven's idea of including narrower subject areas (despite me just suggesting graphic novels on a whim!) by country. I second the nomination of Sweden (either with or without the rest of Scandinavia).

#22 I probably wasn't clear enough in my initial post. The conclusions were the ones we came to at the end of last year, and that we tried to address this year (2012). The only comment I got this year on the comments from last year was that the themes worked better when we focused on regions, as opposed to non-regional themes, not that the regions were too broad. However, your point that we were seldom crossing paths is a valid one; when I set up the voting thread, I will ask yes/no questions as previously and so can ask separately about, e.g., Sweden by itself and Scandinavia. That way we can get a sense of how narrowed down the RG readers would like the themes to be.

#20 - I got the feeling from the last round of voting that the ideas which were successful were more likely to be those which were broader or easier to understand, presumably because more people looked at those and thought, yes I have an idea of what I would like to read for that. I don't really have any suggestion for what to do about this, except perhaps if the idea is not immediately understandable, we could include a short summary in the voting message. Rebecca could ask the initial nominator to write that summary rather than having to come up with all of them herself!

We already had Sweden as the theme read in January 2010. Has it been long enough yet for a revisit? I'm not saying the answer is no, just asking. The group has grown so a lot of the current members were not around back then.

I think picking a single country could work--that's how I did my own reading this year, and I got a lot out of it.

That said, I have reservations about South Africa, which was one of my countries this year. There is a lot of wonderful South African literature, but most of it seems to be written by White South Africans. I don't know why that is, maybe the Bantu education act?

I think that for this group, it would be nice to choose a country with a broad selection of Black African novelists.
I'd suggest Nigeria: Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Ben Okri, Chimamanda Adichie etc. I think both Achebe and Adichie have new books coming out, so that's inticing.

Or we could do a focus on Western Africa. I think that would be interesting as it would include the countries where most African Americans have ancestry.

#20 Yes, I could add a little explanation to the questions that seem to call out for them.

#21 Forgot that we did Sweden; I guess I didn't participate in that read.

Keep those suggestions coming! I'll keep this thread open for another week or so, and then start the voting thread.

Would Canada work for a peaceful category?

Also, is there interest in India/Pakistan based reading?

We try to focus on non-English-speaking countries, so I don't think Canada would be right for this group, unless we narrowly focused on French Canadian writing -- or possibly on writing from Francophone countries, although that wouldn't necessarily be peaceful!

OK--no Canada, that makes sense.
Francophone countries would make an interesting mix!

I like the idea of choosing a region where there are common themes, but numerous and diverse writers, and therefore the potential for discovering some that may be excellent but lesser known. If Steven's suggestion of South Africa were broadened to include some other countries in the region, there should be a very rich selection to choose from. Just as an example, I recently acquired the anthology, Women Writing Africa: The Southern Region, which includes short selections (fiction, poetry, personal narrative etc.) by 120+ writers born or living in Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia , South Africa, Swaziland and Zimbabwe. It spans the period 1842 - 2001, and does seem to include both a fair representation of black writers and a mix of original languages. Perhaps that grouping of countries could be considered.

Southern Africa is very interesting, and there are tons of good writers. If we end up choosing that region, I will definitely participate. But I would prefer a different region.

So, after one week of suggestions, here are the ones we have so far.

Regions & Countries
Northern Africa (e.g., Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya)
Southeast Asia/"Asia 4 (i.e., Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei, Timor Leste, Maldives, Brunei)+ the Philippines
Literature from India/South Asia NOT originally written in English
The (former) British Empire (might fit in with colonialism/postcolonialism theme)
South America (perhaps focusing on one or more themes such as magic realism, colonialism and liberation, oppression and incarceration, crime novels, mythology and folklore, award winners, nineteenth century writers, indigenous peoples, peasants)(Also perhaps looking separately at works written in Spanish, Portuguese, or indigenous languages)
Mexico (or Mexico and Central America)
South Africa (or South Africa and other southern African countries such as Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, and Swaziland)
Sweden (or Scandinavia generally -- some people remember Sweden as an earlier theme read)
Nigeria (or western Africa generally, e.g., Africa 6: Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Cote d’Ivoire, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Saint Helena, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Togo)
Countries that are peaceful, prosperous, and free
Francophone countries

Themes
Genre fiction from around the world, or by region, e.g., Asia (lots of Japanese crime, fantasy, sci-fi, Chinese martial arts novels, etc).
Banned books
Colonialism/postcolonialism (perhaps limited by region or by colonizing power)
Racism (perhaps limited by region)
Debut novels
Books published since 2000
Emerging young writers
Magical realism
Biographical fiction
Surrealism
Retellings of mythology or folktales
National/regional award winners/longlists etc .
Graphic novels

I think I have captured everyone's ideas so far, but please let me know if I left anyone out.

And keep the ideas coming for the next week. I'll probably set up the voting threads next weekend.

>30 banjo123:-32 Perhaps if francophone countries are selected, Canada could be included. I am not sure if many people outside Canada realize that there are many different francophone voices within the country: québecois, haitian, acadian, western and so on. Just as examples, I believe quite a few people read Mister Blue this year and others read books by Dany Laferrière.

I'd like to suggest Civil War; and if that's too broad, it can be narrowed by combining it with an interesting geographical area: civil war in sub-saharan Africa, as I think there's enough civil wars/warlords in that part of the world to support a theme read like that.

*as an aside, I'd like to say up front that I cannot be a theme read leader in 2013.

I don't know if it has been done but what about something related to British country house or British landed gentry as a theme?

If you see my post #31 above, you will see that we concentrate on fiction from non-English-speaking countries. LT does have an Anglophiles group that might interest you.

Keep those ideas coming, everyone! I will have time over the weekend to set up the voting thread, so please post your ideas over the next few days.

One topic to add, although I have not found a good way to describe it yet. Family sagas/time sweep novels, with which I mean books covering several generations of a family or; those broad, sweeping novels that go through several centuries.

I'm thinking here of books like:

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
A Lifetime Burning by Linda Gillard
Roots by Alex Haley

I hope that's not too confusing....

Samantha kathy--those are both interesting ideas.

Rebeccanyc, thanks for all your work on this!

Another possible topic---the former Soviet Union. Or has that been done?

Hi, I'm a returning member I'd like to start participating again.
How about looking at the representation of masculinity across a particular century - you could limit it to one region.

I personally would also like to look at German literature (as Asia and Africa tend to get focussed on a lot), not sure if this has been done previously?

>41 Samantha_kathy: under that list I'd add The Book of Fathers by Miklos Vamos, which I loved.

43> Maybe make it central Europe instead of just German literature?

#42 We did a theme read on post-revolutionary Russian literature a few years ago (i.e., both Soviet and post-Soviet).

I would be interested in a theme read of 20th and 21st century Central/Eastern European writing, though.

>46 rebeccanyc: That sounds like an interesting one.

I'm very interested in a theme read of North African literature.

This is the LAST DAY to make suggestions; I'm going to set up the voting thread tomorrow!

Thank you Rebecca.

THe voting thread is OPEN! Come on over and vote for next year's reads!

Thank you for putting this all together!