Cooperative Children's Book Center: Books By and About American Indians

The School of Education at the University of Wisconsin is home to the Cooperative Children’s Book Center (CCBC). At CCBC, they devote resources and attention to multicultural literature. On their website is a page called “Children’s Books by and about People of Color Published in the United States” that documents the number of books published by and about African Americans, Asian/Pacific and Asian Pacific Americans, Latinos, and American Indians. 

Here’s their stats on American Indians for the period from 2002-2005. In each of these years, CCBC estimates about 5000 children’s books were published.

In 2002:
6 books by Native authors were published
64 books about American Indians were published

In 2003:
11 books by Native authors were published
95 books about American Indians were published

In 2004:
7 books by Native authors were published
33 books about American Indians were published

In 2005:
4 books by Native authors were published
34 books about American Indians were published

Prior to 2002, CCBC’s data combined the “by” and “about” totals as follows:

1994: 70
1995: 83
1996: 50
1997: 66
1998: 50
1999: 61
2000: 54
2001: 96

CCBC publishes several excellent print and internet resources. For example, take a look at their page on the Native Peoples of Wisconsin. You can access CCBC Choices (their annual review of recommended books) via the internet, in pdf format.