Book Fairs as Spaces of Cultural and Economic Negotiation: Cultural Policies of International Book Fairs and Their Guests of Honour

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This research project examines book fairs as spaces of cultural, political, aesthetic and economic negotiation due to their practice of inviting countries, regions or cities as Guests of Honour. In order to develop a comparative perspective of this issue, Portugal, France and other French-speaking countries or regions have completed the project’s initial selection of guest countries originally limited to Spain, Mexico and Germany.By means of the institutional interface of the most important international book fairs in Germany (Frankfurt Book Fair), Mexico (FIL Guadalajara) and Spain (Feria del Libro de Madrid and LIBER) – widening the scope in the project’s second part to Argentina (FIL Buenos Aires) and some selected fairs in Anglophone countries (London Book Fair, LéaLA Los Angeles) –, interferences and interactions of the respective book markets and literary fields are mapped and interpreted. The project consists of four different parts, which are related to three general research lines. They consider book fairs as social and political (line A), aesthetic (line B) and economic spaces of negotiation (line C). The first subproject (line A) offers a socio-anthropological study on the Spanish and Hispanic American book markets and their actors by analyzing their institutionalized exchange, strategies of self-representation as well as the influencing of actors of the political field at international book fairs. The second project line B reflects upon aesthetic aspects of the multi-media representations by Guests of Honour (national pavilions, accompanying exhibitions and retrospectives, theater and music performances, image films etc.). The third subproject (line C) analyzes strategies and subventions for the promotion of culture (translation grants etc.) and the marketing strategies employed by official cultural institutions and publishing houses in the context of international book fairs from the point of view of cultural diversity (‘bibliodiversity’) in the book industries. Finally, the last part of the project brings together the findings of the three subprojects in order to paradigmatically reflect upon the presentations of Spain and its most representative cities and regions at international book fairs between 1991 and 2021. This includes the identification of good practices and promising strategies in the field of culture and literature marketing at international book fairs that are applica beyond the Spanish example, too.