OLIKA in the world
Equality in Azerbaijan
Together with the Swedish Institute and the initiative Creative Force, we met organizations that work for women's rights and talked about how we work at OLIKA with book publishers, authors, illustrators and journalists in Baku. The project manager was Mahira, who lives in Sweden but is herself from Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan. We would have done the same thing in Moscow but Russia's invasion of Ukraine put an end to that.
Bright's Agency
We are selling book rights together with our sub-agent Stephanie Barrouillet at Brights Agency. She sells at the major fairs in Frankfurt, Bologna, Shanghai, London and New York. Stephanie, who has a Masters in Children's Literature and Gender, specializes in representing small independent publishers. A highlight was when Stephanie managed to sell the rights to Give Your Child 100 Opportunities to the US and the entire English-speaking part of the world!
Guest of Honor in Bologna
When Sweden was Guest of Honor at the big children's book fair in Bologna, we were invited by the Swedish Embassy to give a lecture on gender equality and equality in the world of children's books to Italian journalists and people of culture. The first time we were interpreted live! We have done the same thing at the embassy in Madrid and participated in an exhibition at the embassy in Washington.
About him in the BBC podcast
After we published Kivi and Monsterhund in 2012, the first children's book to use hen as a personal pronoun, media interest absolutely exploded. Soon the exciting journalist Nina Porzuki got in touch. She had heard about the debate in Sweden and wanted to make a podcast episode about it in her BBC podcast "World in Words".
We were especially fond of the title "The three letter word that rocked a nation". So gorgeous! Think that we have been involved in shaking up the pronoun foundation. We are proud of them!
Meet journalists
We collaborate with the Swedish Institute and meet journalists from all over the world. We talk about OLIKA and how we create children's books that also contribute to gender equality and equality. And if we're lucky, they write a report and talk about us and our books. We also take the opportunity to ask what it looks like in their countries, and how they think about children's literature that wants to create an inclusive society.
Speaker at Nordic Webinarium
When Finland's Ministry of Social Affairs and Health held a Nordic seminar in 2022 on gender equality in preschool, we were invited to talk about OLIKA. We believe that children's books should not only be fun for children and educators to read, but also live up to the preschool curriculum. Then it will be easy for the preschool to work for equal treatment, equality and equality.
Exhibition in Washington
When Christina Knight, one of Sweden's most prominent Creative Directors, decided to push for equality in the advertising industry, we published the books Mad Women and Not buying it together. Christina lectures around the world and together with the Swedish Embassy in Washington, she created an exhibition with, among other things, Give your child 100 opportunities Instead of 2. Today, Christina runs the Mad Women Academy, which promotes equality in an unequal advertising industry!
Internship and integration
We are happy to accept interns and are a help in working life. One of the most recent is Agnes, who among other things has been involved in creating our quizzes. It can be especially challenging for people from other countries to enter the labor market, and we can help there. Thank you Helén from Thailand, Mahira from Azerbaijan, Ksenia from Russia and Alessia from Italy. Among other things, Mahira managed our project in Azerbaijan and if Russia had not invaded Ukraine, Ksenia would have done the same project in Russia. Alessia translated books into Italian and worked with Italian publishers.
