Celebrating Intellectual Freedom: Banned Books Week

It's no coincidence that the Collingswood Book Festival is anchored by Banned Books Week, a national week of awareness about the real and ongoing problem of censorship in the literary world.

Since the first Banned Books week in 1982, more than 11,000 titles have been challenged, which means someone has attempted to have them removed from circulation in a public or school library based on personal objections to their contents.

The issue with challenges, says the American Library Association (ALA), is that although the vast majority are initiated locally by protective parents, the efforts to remove books from circulation affects access to such materials for an entire community of readers.

In the classroom

What may seem weirder still is the fact that many of the most commonly challenged books are also some of the most highly regarded works of American literature, and have been taught in classrooms for decades:

• The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
• The Grapes of Wrath and Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
• The Color Purple by Alice Walker
• The Lord of the Flies by William Golding
• Animal Farm and 1984 by George Orwell
• The Sun Also Rises and A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
• Beloved and Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
• In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

Collingswood doesn't seem to be a town in which such concerns have often reared their head, thankfully. In an email to Collingswood Patch, district Chief Academic Officer Mark Wiltsey said he has "never had an issue" with book challenges.

"It is one of the joys of teaching in this district," said Wiltsey, who is one of the architects of the Collingswood High School summer reading program. "The parents treat us as professionals and they trust that we are putting rigorous, relevant and purposeful books into the hands of our students."

Superintendent Scott Oswald responded that on the handful of occasions in which a parent has remarked about the content of an assigned text, those concerns have never been allowed to filter into the general academic population.

"We respect their right to have a say in what their kids read without limiting what other students may read," Oswald wrote. "Sometimes, a parent comes in, sits with the teacher or supervisor, reviews the title, and leaves with a completely different perspective. It’s what learning is all about."

In the community

Book challenges and censorship questions are not confined to the public school system, however. In 2011 alone, the ALA Ofice of Intellectual Freedom received 326 challenges of books on the grounds that they contained offensive language, violence, cultural or religious insensitivity or explicity sexuality. The ALA further estimates that as many as 60-70 percent of challenges may go unreported.

"Censorship infantilizes would-be readers," said Collingswood Public Library Director Brett Bonfield in an email to Patch. "That's going to discourage inquiry. And discouraging inquiry is anathema to promoting literacy."

Although Bonfield couldn't think of a time in his four-year tenure that censorship has been a problem in Collingswood, library Youth Services Coordinator Dot Garabedian—who arranged an enlightening display on banned books that is currently available for viewing in the library—has the benefit of a slightly longer memory.

"In the mid-90s a book was published entitled, It's Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex & Sexual Health by Robie H. Harris," Garabedian wrote to Patch in an email. "This book was touted by educators and health professionals but caused a controversy with conservatives.

"There was an older woman who frequented the library, very concerned about this book. Although she never made a formal complaint for taking it from the catalog, she would steal it repeatedly. This book was replaced multiple times, but would mysteriously 'disappear' until this person moved from the area.

"Of course, we could not prove it, but any book that she spoke to a staff member about would vanish!" Garabedian recalled.

Over the past year, the 10 most challenged titles were:

1. ttyl; ttfn; l8r, g8r (series) by Lauren Myracle
2. The Color of Earth (series) by Kim Dong Hwa

3. The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins
4. My Mom's Having A Baby! A Kid's Month-by-Month Guide to Pregnancy by Dori Hillestad Butler
5. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
6. Alice (series) by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
7. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
8. What My Mother Doesn't Know by Sonya Sones
9. Gossip Girl (series) by Cecily Von Ziegesar
10. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

"In general, I'm not particularly worried about the books that make the
list of most challenged titles," Bonfield wrote.

"By the time they make these lists, they've usually found their readers, so even if one book store or library doesn't carry them, a person interested in these books can usually find some way to get hold of a copy—not always, of course, which is why we need to fight censorship," he wrote.

"I worry more about the less-well-known books that might not get published, widely distributed, or even written, because of internalized concerns about censorship battles by writers, publishers, librarians, and teachers," Bonfield wrote.

"In general, reasonable people try to avoid conflict. Censors, on the other hand, seek it out."

If you’re interested in celebrating Banned Books Week as part of a lesson for your kids—or simply to feel like a rebellious reader—check out these additional resources:

• Mapping Censorship, a visual representation of places books have been challenged in the US, created from cases documented by the ALA and the Kids’ Right to Read Project
• Virtual Read-Out, a worldwide celebration of the freedom to read, featured on a dedicated Banned Books Week YouTube channel
• State-by-state listing of BBW events
• Banned Books Week on Facebook and Twitter
• Free BBW downloads from the ALA, like badges and Facebook cover art