The meeting, which will promote literature from both regions, is co-organized by Ana Paula Laborinho, Director of Multilingualism at the OEI, Mário Lúcio, artist and former Minister of Culture of Cape Verde; Inés Miret, consultant and director of the Emilia Laboratory, José Castilho and Dolores Prades.

According to the press release, the theme of the meeting will be «Utopia as resistance. Resistance as utopia».

Its aim is to promote literature and encourage reading, especially in the Portuguese and Spanish languages in Africa, Latin America and Europe.

The initiative will take place in Tarrafal, Cape Verde between November 13 and 14, at the Tarrafal Culture Market, coinciding with the closing of the OEI's International Conference on Portuguese and Spanish Languages (CILPE), which will also be held in the island country and which this year will work on multilingualism and interculturality to promote a more inclusive and global citizenship.

“Africa has 82 million illiterate people and the Caribbean has 32 million. What do these people read? How do they read?” reflected Mário Lúcio during the presentation.

“Africa is a continent of stories, we were born and raised telling stories (...). We are what we read, but there are many ways of reading and we (Africa) want to be in this dialog with Ibero-America,” said Mário Lúcio.

Ana Paula Laborinho, for her part, emphasized the value of the networks that had been set up to make this seminar possible: “a dream that has come true this year as a result of the commitment we've made at the OEI to dialogue between languages, not just between Spanish and Portuguese, but also with the indigenous languages of the region”.

“Ler: África - Ibero-América se leem” presents itself as a space to promote transcontinental dialog and the strengthening of international networks, a meeting that will bring together writers, publishers, illustrators, mediators and those responsible for reading policies from Africa, Latin America and Europe, at an especially symbolic moment, as it coincides with the fiftieth anniversary of the independence of several African countries.

Under the slogan “Utopia as resistance. Resistance as utopia”, the meeting aims to consolidate a space to reclaim the power of the word as a tool for emancipation, memory and social justice.

Through seminars, workshops and parallel activities, cultural cooperation will be encouraged and new forms of access to books and reading will be explored, with a democratic, inclusive and transformative approach.

With more than 850 million speakers, Spanish and Portuguese are present on five continents and are projected to be the fastest-growing bilingual community in the coming years.