Open a book, open your mind @ your library

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

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

ALA poster

Banned Books Week

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

First a bit about our Constitutional Rights to Intellectual Freedom

poster

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

The ability to express and explore diverse opinion

Intellectual freedom

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Right to seek information

Intellectual freedom

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Intellectual freedom

Right to choice information from all points of view

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Banned Book Week

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

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Why?

Freedom of speech and press require an understanding that others have different opinions and ideas.However throughout world history, those with different ideas have been sought out and silenced.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Books and libraries have been burned as a method

of controlling thought and knowledge

throughout world history.

Book Burning

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

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/bookburning/20thcentury/nazigermany/nazigermany.htm

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Year 1943

Midway through World War II, the U.S. Office of War Information used this poster to help Americans understand why we were fighting.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Still book burning happens today and …even in America.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

by Ray BradburySet in the future when all books are banned, people called “firemen”burn confiscated books. Ironically, This book was banned as "dangerous." [451 degrees is the temperature that paper catches fire.]

http://library.dixie.edu/new/whybanned.html

Fahrenheit 451

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

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."

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Censorship

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

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

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.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

James and the Giant Peach

by Roald DahlThis book was banned in a Florida elementaryschool because "it promotes the use of drugs, tobacco, and whiskey."

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

What is meant by altered?

“Objectionable words are erasedwhiting or blacking out wordsconcealing or changing illustrations

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

In the Night Kitchen

by Maurice SendakWhen toddler Mickeyenters the Night Kitchen, he loses his pajamas and spends much of the story naked.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Baseball Saved Us

by Ken MochizuchiChallengedbecause of a racial slur used in the book.http://www.pacificcitizen.org/content/2006/national/jun16-lin-baseball.htm

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Why are books challenged?

Sometimes books are challengedbecause they have offended someone.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

The Lorax

by Dr. SeussBanned in the Laytonville, California School District ongrounds that this book "criminalizes the forestry industry."

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

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.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Little House in the Big Woods

by Laura Ingalls WilderBanned for being "racially offensive" to Indians.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Why are books challenged?

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

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Pinkerton, Behave!

by Kellogg, Steven. Challenged, but retained despite complaints that the image of a masked burglar pointing a gun at woman is too violent for young readers.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

A Wrinkle in Time

by Madeline L'Engle,one of the 1990'smost-challenged children's authors. This Newbery book was banned because it "challenges religious beliefs".

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Who has the right to restrict?

“Parents-and only parents-have the right and the responsibility to restrictthe access of their children-and only their children-to library resources” Free Access to Libraries for Minors, an interpretation of the American Library Association’s Library Bill of Rights

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Harry Potter (the entire series)

by J. K. RowlingChallenged based on the claim that the books promoted witchcraft, however the parents making the charge failed to prove that the series promotes the Wicca religion thus does not constitute advocacy of a religion.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret

by Judy Blume author of Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing It’s about girl stuff…changing bodies and a girl’s search inchoosing a religion.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

American Library Association (2004) announces author Judy Blume ranks as second most censored author of the past 15 years

“It's not just the books under fire now that worry me. It is the books that will never be written. The books that will never be read. And all due to the fear of censorship. As always, young readers will be the real losers.” — Judy Blume, author of Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

What does she mean?

Publishers have told writersto change wording in fear of censorshipBooks have been pulled from the shelf in fear of complaintsWriters hesitate to create unique and different works

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry

by Mildred D. Taylor A parent in Florida demanded that this Newbery novel be banned from all schools in Seminole County. She objected to its depiction of Southern racism, which she considered inappropriate for kids.

The award-winning book depicts the life of a African-American family in rural Mississippi in the 1930s and uses the “N” word.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

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.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Captain Underpants

By Pilkey, Dav challenged for encouraging childrento disobey grownups.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Goosebumps (series)

by R. L. Stineoften challengedin libraries for their sometimes-violent content.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

We still have the freedom to read…

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

How to Eat Fried Worms

by Thomas Rockwell“The idea of eating worms as part of a bet is thought to be disgusting by some. The book has been the frequent target of censors.”

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

A Light in the Attic

By Shel SilversteinSome claim that it "encourages" childrento break dishes in order to get out of having to dry them.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

The Stupids (series)

By Harry Allard, authorof Miss Nelson Is Missing!

Challenged because “it might encourage children to disobey their parents."

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

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.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

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."

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

The Giver

by Lois LowryA Newbery Award winner, this futuristicbook is about a “perfect” community where anyone who is different disappears.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

The Bridge to Terabithia

by Katherine PatersonAnother Newbery Award winner, banned due to “discussion of death”…“swear words”…“disrespect of adults, and an elaborate fantasy world” which was “felt might lead to confusion.“http://www.library.ucla.edu/college/nwsevnts/exhibits/banned99/index.htm

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

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.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language

Challenged because it included the definitions of words considered “obscene”

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

and the series most loved…

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

and despised…America’s Favorite Kindergartener

In 2004 Barbara Parkwas selected as one ofthe American Library Association’s10 Most Frequently Challenged Authors

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Junie B. Jones(series)

by Barbara ParkThe spunky kindergartener (first grader in more recent volumes)is prone to troublemaking, often calls people names and isn’t 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 mainstaysof her vocabulary.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/26/fashion/26junie.html?pagewanted=all

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

So…

I invite you to read a banned

book.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Veteran School Librarian Pat Scales

suggests that banned books have important lessons to teach youth.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

These books can help to:

Spark open and honest discussionUnderstand and debate real-life issuesLearn to function in a changing societyNurture intellectual growthEncourage creative and critical thinkingRecognize and accept cultural differencesValue literature of all genres

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

“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.”

ALA President Michael Gorman states,

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Other noteworthy titles

http://www.library.ucla.edu/college/nwsevnts/exhibits/banned99/index.htm

A Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Newton Peck Banned from the St. Lawrence School in Utica, Mich. (1997) because of a passage involving pig breeding. 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.

Open a book, open your mind @ your library

Shrek!

by William Steighttp://www.lib.virginia.edu/small/exhibits/censored/child.html

ErrorThe book in question was Sylvester and the Magic Pebble