2021: My Year In Reading – The Stats
Last year, I made the goal to increase my female-identifying and Black Indigenous People of Color (BIPOC) author reading by 10 percent – two demographics that together made up roughly 26 percent* of my reading last year.
Throughout 2021, I was more diligent in tracking my author and genre stats (although I have some fuzzy math, because that’s never been a strong suit), and it was eye-opening to see how non-diverse your reading can still be even when making a conscious effort to read more thoughtfully.
How’d I do? My goal was achieved with 36 percent of authors read identifying as female and/or BIPOC:
31 percent of my reading was written by a female-identifying author, a 63 percent increase from 2020.
13 percent of my reading was written by a BIPOC-identifying author (including female-identifying), which is a 23 percent decrease from 2020.
But, those numbers alone don’t tell the whole story.
BIPOC is one diverse identifying marker of authors, but it can ignore Asian and Latinx writers, not to mention LGBTQIA+-identifying writers that may fall into multiple, intersecting groups.
Taking that into account:
Six percent of my reading was written by Asian-identifying authors
Five percent of my reading was written by Latinx-identifying authors
27 percent of my reading was written by LGBTQIA+ authors, a 16 percent increase from 2020
One percent of my reading was from a non-binary author, on par with 2020
All told, 18 percent of my reading was by authors that view themselves as a racial minority, which was a 29 percent increase over 2020.
While I’m happy to have achieved my goals, there are still crucial voices missing from that list, like individuals living with disabilities or chronic illness.
In 2021, I’m going to challenge myself to have 45 percent of authors I read not be like me – meaning a white, cis-gendered male that identifies as gay (note: LBTQIA+-identifying people will be considered diverse).
Like many industries, there is a reckoning in publishing to increase diversity at major publishing houses. I credit my local library and its multiple reading challenges, plus #Bookstagram, for helping introduce me to a variety of reads by diverse authors.
If you want to expand diversity in your reading or listening, I highly encourage those two outlets as a place to start.
*All percentages are estimates rounded to the nearest whole number. Since manual and automatic calculations were used, they do not always synch up perfectly, but are still generally reflective of my reading activity.
Explore more of my 2021 reading and listening:
