Treasure Your Freedom to Read

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Treasure Your Freedom to Read

• Banned Books Week
• an opportunity to educate students about one of
  our most precious freedoms in a democracy and the
  role of libraries

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Banned Books Week

• ALA poster

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First a bit about our Constitutional Rights to
Intellectual Freedom

• poster

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Intellectual freedom

• The ability to express and explore diverse
  opinion

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Intellectual freedom

• Right to seek information

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Intellectual freedom

• Right to choice information from all points
  of view

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Banned Book Week

• Reminds Americans not to take this precious
  Right of Intellectual Freedom for granted.

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Why?

• Freedom of speech and press require an
  understanding that others have different opinions
  and ideas.

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Freedom of Speech denied

• However throughout world history, those with
  different ideas have been
  sought out and silenced.

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Book Burning

• Books and libraries have been burned as a method
  of controlling thought and knowledge throughout
  world history.

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1933 Nazi bonfires

• Thousands of books smolder in a huge bonfire as
  Germans give the Nazi salute during the wave of
  book-burnings that spread throughout Germany.

http//www.ala.org/ala/oif/bannedbooksweek/bookbur
ning/20thcentury/nazigermany/nazigermany.htm
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Fahrenheit 451

• by Ray BradburySet in the future when all books
  are banned, people called firemenburn
  confiscated books. Perhaps the most ironic
  banned book situation, this book was banned as
  "dangerous." 451 degrees is the temperature
  that paper catches fire. http//library.dixie.edu
  /new/whybanned.html

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But as the author of Fahrenheit 451,

• Ray Bradbury, said, "You don't have to burn
  books to destroy a culture. Just get people to
  stop reading them."

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The Story of Ferdinand by Munro Leaf

• It is the story of a bull who would rather smell
  flowers than fight in bullfights.
• Banned in Spain was seen by many supporters of
  Francisco Franco during the Spanish Civil War as
  a pacifist book and burned as propaganda in Nazi
  Germany, the book had over 60 foreign
  translations and has never gone out of print. The
  story was adapted into a Walt Disney film which
  won a 1938 Academy Award.

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Censorship

• The act of getting rid of information that
  others consider not acceptable.
• Books are censored when they are banned or
  altered.

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What is meant by banned?

• A book, that has been banned, has been removed
  from the shelf. All readers are denied
  access to the material.

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Captain Underpants

• By Pilkey, Dav challenged for encouraging
  childrento disobey grownups.

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What is meant by altered?

• Objectionable words are erased
• whiting or blacking out words
• concealing or changing illustrations

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Baseball Saved Us

• by Ken MochizuchiChallengedbecause of a
  racial slur used in the book.http//www.pacific
  citizen.org/content/2006/national/jun16-lin-baseba
  ll.htm

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Why are books challenged?

• Sometimes books are challengedbecause they have
  offended someone.

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Sylvester and the Magic Pebble

• by William Steig In 1977, the Illinois Police
  Association urged librarians to remove the
  book, which portrays its characters as animals,
  and presents the police as pigs.The American
  Library Association reported similar complaints
  in 11 other states.

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Why are books challenged?

• Books are usually challengedby people with good
  intentions-to protect others, usually children,
  from difficult ideas and truths.

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In a Dark, Dark Room, and Other Scary Stories

• by Alvin Schwartz Reason banned Too morbid for
  children. The Green Ribbonhttp//www.listafter
  list.com/tabid/57/listid/4602/Books/1stAmendment
  VersusParentingBannedChildrensBooks.aspxixzz1
  ZizFhfby

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Who has the right to restrict?

• Parents-and only parents-have the right and the
  responsibility to restrict the access of their
  children-and only their children-to library
  resources Free Access to Libraries for Minors,
  an interpretation of the American Library
  Associations Library Bill of Rights

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Bony-Legs by Joanna Cole

• Reason banned Deals with subjects such as magic
  and witchcraft.http//www.listafterlist.com/tabid
  /57/listid/4602/Books/1stAmendmentVersusParenti
  ngBannedChildrensBooks.aspxixzz1ZiyWLbtl

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Challenged Books

• Although they were the targets of attempted
  bannings, most of the books featured during BBW
  were not banned, thanks to the efforts of
  librarians to maintain them in their collections.

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We still have the freedom to read
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A Light in the Attic

• By Shel Silversteinchallenged by an elementary
  school in Beloit, Wisconsin, in 1985 because the
  poem How Not to Dry the Dishes encourages
  children to break dishes in order to get out of
  having to dry them.

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The Stupids (series)

• By Harry Allard, authorof Miss Nelson Is
  Missing! Challenged because it might
  encourage children to disobey their parents."

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The Elephants Child, one of the Just So
Stories
By Rudyard Kipling

• Challenged in the Davenport, Iowa community
  school district in 1993 because the book is "99
  violent." Throughout the book, when the main
  character, an elephant child, asks a question, he
  receives a spanking instead of answers.
• http//www.navapanga.com/2010/10/30/crocodile-caug
  ht-hold-of-baby-elephants-trunk-in-african-waterho
  le/

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Bumps in the Night

• by Allard, Harry Dudley Stork and his friends
  search for the cause the spooky noises in his
  house. Challenged for references to the
  super-natural.

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Where the Wild Things Are

• Maurice Sendak's classic Where the Wild Things
  Are has been challenged for involving
  "witchcraft/supernatural elements."

"witchcraft/supernatural elements."
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Tar Beach

• by Faith Ringgold Challenged for stereotyping
  African-Americans as eating fried chicken and
  watermelon and drinking beer at a family
  picnic. This same book won the 1992 Coretta
  Scott King Illustrator Award for its portrayal of
  minorities.

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Mirandy and Brother Wind by Patricia McKissack

• Challenged at the Glen Springs Elementary School
  in Gainesville, Fla. (1991) because of the book's
  use of black dialect.

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The Five Chinese Brothersby Bishop, Claire
Huchet, and Kurt Wiese, 1938.

• Challenged at Colton, CA, elementary schools
  (1998) and Spokane, WA, school district (1994)
• According to critics, The Five Chinese Brothers
  includes "racial stereotypes demeaning to Chinese
  people" and "violent plots to execute five
  brothers.

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Little Red Riding Hood

• You wouldnt think there would be anything wrong
  with this retelling, based on the lovely cover
  illustration, would you?

But eagle-eyed readers, not just tipsy types,
will have spotted the bottle in Reds basket, and
that meant trouble someyears ago in Culver City,
CA. You see, Reds mother had packed the basket
with a loaf of bread, some sweet butter, and a
bottle of wine. St. Petersburg Times- St.
Petersburg, Fla. May 1990.
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and the series most loved
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and despisedAmericas Favorite Kindergartener

• In 2004 Barbara Parkwas selected as one ofthe
  American Library Associations10 Most Frequently
  Challenged Authors

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Junie B. Jones (series) by Barbara Park

• The spunky kindergartener (first grader in more
  recent volumes) is prone to troublemaking, often
  calls people names and isnt averse to talking
  back to her teachers. And though she is the
  narrator of the stories, she struggles with
  grammar words like funnest and beautifuller are
  the mainstays of her vocabulary
• http//www.nytimes.com/2007/07/26/fashion/26junie.
  html?pagewantedall

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So

• I invite you to
• read a banned book.

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Sylvester and the Magic PebbleBy William Steig

• Remember this slide?
• One website in 2006 mistaken this banned book for

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Shrek!

• by William Steighttp//www.lib.virginia.edu/small
  /exhibits/censored/child.html
• Error
• Always check your sources.

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Veteran School Librarian Pat Scales

• suggests that banned books have important lessons
  to teach youth.

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These books can help to

• Spark open and honest discussion
• Understand and debate real-life issues
• Learn to function in a changing society
• Nurture intellectual growth
• Encourage creative and critical thinking
• Recognize and accept cultural differences
• Value literature of all genres

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ALA President Michael Gorman states,

• I believe the more we exerciseour freedom to
  read and read widely, the better equipped we are
  to make good decisions and govern ourselves,
• He said, Controversial ideas should be debated,
  not driven into dark alleys.