Afghan children's picture books

The Afghan Children's book project will create an illustrated children's book by collecting children's stories from Afghan Australians living around Dandenong. There are almost no children’s books in Afghan languages worldwide. We want to create a book which depicts contemporary and traditional Afghan stories with original artwork. This project will give the community joy through remembering stories from the past and handing them onto the future generations. The story collecting process will uncover and celebrate the hidden talents of Afghan Australian story tellers, writers and artists. We will also document this unique experience through filming the story collection activities.

10,000 Afghan Australians live in and around Dandenong. Most children’s stories in Afghan languages have never been written down or illustrated. Due to war and unrest in Afghanistan there has never been opportunity to create children's books. The project will celebrate our creativity and keep our culture alive for our children. It will build our children's pride in their languages and heritage. We will support translators from our community to edit stories and will showcase the talents of Afghan Australian artists who will illustrate the book. We will also share our stories with the broader community by providing English translations.