Banned Books Week

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Banned Books Week

• September 26 to October 4, 2009

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What does it mean to ban a book?

• Banning a book is when a person or group decides
  that a book is so inappropriate in some way that
  NO ONE should read the book. Then the person or
  group has the book removed from the shelves of
  libraries.

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How does a book get banned?

• An individual or group files a formal challenge
  with a school or library, requesting that a book
  or material be removed
• The school or library forms a committee to review
  the material
• The committee votes on if the material should be
  removed or retained
• If the material is kept on the shelf, the person
  filing the complaint may file another complaint
  with the court system, which then will review the
  case

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From WHERE are books banned?

• Just because a book may be banned in one
  location, that does NOT mean it is banned
  everywhere. We call books banned books if they
  have been banned somewhere.
• Here at CCHS, we have not banned any books from
  our media center. The public library in Moultrie
  has had only one challenge in the last 35 years
  ago and the book was moved to the adult section
  from the teen section of the library, not removed
  from the library.

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How often are books banned?

• In 2007, there were 420 REPORTED challenges. A
  challenge is defined as a formal, written
  complaint, filed with a library or school
  requesting that materials be removed because of
  content or appropriateness.
• A book is challenged if someone requests that it
  be removed from library shelves.
• A book is banned if the library or school agrees
  to remove it from circulation.

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Why are books challenged or banned?

• Books usually are challenged to protect others,
  frequently children, from difficult ideas and
  information.
• Most librarians see challenges as grounded in
  good intention and pure in conviction, but they
  are ultimately illegal and restrictive.

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Why are books challenged or banned?The ISSUES

• Family values
• (including religious values)
• Political values
• Intellectual freedom

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Official Book Censorship

• Librorum Prohibitorum, in effect by the Catholic
  Church from 1557-1966
• Pope Paul IV issued the first of 42 indices to
  guide censors in what could be published. Books
  were not to be published without official
  permission from the Catholic Church (Galileos
  book was banned and he was subject of inquisition
  for saying the sun is the center of universe)
• The Soviet Union banned books with political
  philosophies other than Communist
• China and Iran still ban books today, as well as
  other governments

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Why not ban books?Americans 1st Amendment
rights--

• Congress shall make no law respecting an
  establishment of religion, or prohibiting the
  free exercise thereof or abridging the freedom
  of speech, or of the press or the right of the
  people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the
  government for a redress of grievances.

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Whats wrong with Banning Books?

• Books provide education on a wide variety of
  subjects and the opportunity to have an
  experience vicariously
• Without a wide variety of views, change cannot
  occur within a society
• Books such as To Kill a Mockingbird and I know
  why the Caged Bird Sings provide valuable
  information on racism and the effect it has on a
  society

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Effects of Banning Books

• Without the Anne Franks Diary of a Young Girl,
  we would not understand as well how the Holocaust
  affected persecuted people
• Without The Scarlet Letter, how would we
  understand puritan society and how it operated?
• Without Fahrenheit 451, how would you understand
  what effect burning books has on a person and how
  the desire for banned items increases their
  interest and mystery?

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• In other words, reading is an opportunity to
  experience an event without actually living
  through it.

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Should other people decide what
YOU read?

• Parents and teachers are responsible for helping
  you select reading materials while they are still
  responsible for you. As an adult, you will have
  the freedom to read books of your choice and to
  decide what your children may or may not read.

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What books have been banned?

• Banned for depictions of sex, racism, and violence

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• Offensive language

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• Ordered BURNED in East St. Louis for indecency
  and obscenityit actually was restricted to
  adults only instead of being burned

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• Banned in a number of places over the years
  because of objections to the language used and
  the perception that the book promotes racism

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• Fahrenheit 451 is about book burning and the
  effect that banning or censoring books has on a
  society

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• Many have objected to the magical content in
  this book, claiming it promotes witchcraft and
  evil content. (It was written by the daughter of
  Christian missionaries.)

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• Some people feel that this book promotes the use
  of illegal drugs.

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• This book was banned because there is a wine
  bottle in the basket on the cover of the book.
  Some people felt it promoted drinking alcoholic
  beverages (California, 1989)

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• Many have objected to the magical content in
  this book, and the other Harry Potter books,
  claiming it promotes witchcraft and evil content.

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• This book was banned for encouraging
  inappropriate behavior

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• Banned for inappropriate content, promotion of
  cannibalism

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• Banned in some schools and libraries because
  inappropriate pictures

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• Banned in some places because the book is about
  an unconventional penguin family. The book is
  a true story, based on penguins in the Central
  Park Zoo.

BANNED!
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What books have been banned?

• Banned in some schools and libraries because of
  content about the logging industrycriminalizes
  the forestry industry

BANNED!
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10 Most Challenged Books of 2007

• And Tango Makes Three / Richardson and Parnell
• The Chocolate War / Cormier
• Olives Ocean / Henkes
• The Golden Compass / Pullman
• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn / Twain

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• The Color Purple / Walker
• TTYL / Myracle
• I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings / Angelou
• Its Perfectly Normal / Harris
• The Perks of Being a Wallflower / Chobsky

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5 Most Challenged Books of 2008

• 1. "And Tango Makes Three," by Justin
  Richardson/Peter ParnellReasons Anti-Ethnic,
  Anti-Family, Homosexuality, Religious Viewpoint,
  Unsuited to Age Group
• 2. "His Dark Materials Trilogy" (Series), Philip
  PullmanReasons  Political Viewpoint, Religious
  Viewpoint, Violence
• 3. "TTYL" "TTFN" "L8R, G8R" (Series), Lauren
  MyracleReasons  Offensive Language, Sexually
  Explicit, Unsuited to Age Group
• 4. "Scary Stories" (Series), Alvin
  SchwartzReasons  Occult/Satanism, Religious
  Viewpoint, Violence
• 5. "Bless Me, Ultima," by Rudolfo AnayaReasons 
  Occult/Satanism, Offensive Language, Religious
  Viewpoint, Sexually Explicit, Violence
• (Huck Finn was not on the list for the first time
  in many years.)

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Court Cases(Foundations of Free Speech)

• The Right to Read Freely
• Evans v. Selma Union High School District of
  Fresno County, 222 P. 801 (Ca. 1924)
• The California State Supreme Court held that the
  King James version of the Bible was not a
  "publication of a sectarian, partisan, or
  denominational character" that a State statute
  required a public high school library to exclude
  from its collections. The "fact that the King
  James version is commonly used by Protestant
  Churches and not by Catholics" does not "make its
  character sectarian," the court stated. "The mere
  act of purchasing a book to be added to the
  school library does not carry with it any
  implication of the adoption of the theory or
  dogma contained therein, or any approval of the
  book itself, except as a work of literature fit
  to be included in a reference library."

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Court Cases (Foundations of Free Speech)

• Rosenberg v. Board of Education of City of New
  York, 92 N.Y.S.2d 344 (Sup. Ct. Kings County
  1949)
• After considering the charge that Oliver
  Twist and the Merchant of Venice are
  "objectionable because they tend to engender
  hatred of the Jew as a person and as a race," the
  Supreme Court, Kings County, New York, decided
  that these two works cannot be banned from the
  New York City schools, libraries, or classrooms,
  declaring that the Board of Education "acted in
  good faith without malice or prejudice and in the
  best interests of the school system entrusted to
  their care and control, and, therefore, that no
  substantial reason exists which compels the
  suppression of the two books under consideration."

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Court Cases for Free Speech

• Minarcini v. Strongsville (Ohio) City School
  District, 541 F.2d 577 (6th Cir. 1976)
• The Strongsville City Board of Education rejected
  faculty recommendations to purchase Joseph
  Heller's Catch-22 and Kurt Vonnegut's God Bless
  You, Mr. Rosewater and ordered the removal of
  Catch-22 and Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle from the
  library. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth
  Circuit ruled against the School Board, upholding
  the students' First Amendment right to receive
  information and the librarian's right to
  disseminate it. "The removal of books from a
  school library is a much more serious burden upon
  the freedom of classroom discussion than the
  action found unconstitutional in Tinker v. Des
  Moines School District."

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Court Cases(Freedom of Expression in Schools)

• Zykan v. Warsaw (Indiana) Community School
  Corporation and Warsaw School Board of Trustees,
  631 F.2d 1300 (7th Cir. 1980)
• A student brought suit seeking to reverse school
  officials' decision to "limit or prohibit the use
  of certain textbooks, to remove a certain book
  from the school library, and to delete certain
  courses from the curriculum." The district court
  dismissed the suit. On appeal, the Court of
  Appeals for the Seventh Circuit ruled that the
  school board has the right to establish a
  curriculum on the basis of its own discretion,
  but it is forbidden to impose a "pall of
  orthodoxy." The right of students to file
  complaints was recognized, but the court held
  that the students' claims "must cross a
  relatively high threshold before entering upon
  the field of a constitutional claim suitable for
  federal court litigation."

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Court Cases(1st Amendment rights of minors)

• 1 See Erznoznik v. City of Jacksonville, 422 U.S.
  205 (1975) "Speech that is neither obscene as to
  youths nor subject to some other legitimate
  proscription cannot be suppressed solely to
  protect the young from ideas or images that a
  legislative body thinks unsuitable for them. In
  most circumstances, the values protected by the
  First Amendment are no less applicable when
  government seeks to control the flow of
  information to minors."  See also Tinker v. Des
  Moines School Dist., 393 U.S.503 (1969) West
  Virginia Bd. of Ed. v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624
  (1943) AAMA v. Kendrick,. 244 F.3d 572 (7th Cir.
  2001).

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Reading is a joy, a privilege, and the right of
every student. If a book is unappealing or
offensive to you in any way, please return it and
select another. You, the students, know which
reading materials best serve you and your own
standards, reading level, and beliefs.
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What to do about banning books?

• Exercise your rights! Read a banned book today
• Talk to your neighbors about why everyone should
  be allowed to choose for themselves and their
  families what they read

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For more information

• If you want to know more, visit the ALA website
  on challenged and banned books, or read Banned
  Books 2007 Resource Guide by Robert P. Doyle
• Houle, Michelle M. Mark Twain, Banned,
  Challenged, and Censored. Enslow Publishers,
  Berkeley Heights, NJ. 2008.
• Doyle, Robert P. Banned Books 2007 Resource
  Book. American Library Association, Chicago,
  2007.
• http//www.firstamendmentcenter.org/default.aspx

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Colquitt County High School

• Cheryl Youse, Media Specialist
• Presentation Revised April, 2009
• www.colquitt.k12.ga.us/cchsmedia/documents.htm