Its September and you

know what that means. The media

center is gearing up for Banned
Books Week. It kicks off Monday,
September 30
th
and runs until Satur-
day, October 6
th
. This year marks
the 30
th
year the American Library
Association has held the event,
which celebrates your freedom to
read. It also serves to bring nation-
wide attention to recent efforts to
remove or restrict peoples access to
books. (American Library Associa-
tion [ALA], 2012) In honor of the
celebration, those of us here at the
school media center want to tell you
a little about banned books and why
students and parents should care
about them.
Maybe you didnt know this,
but books have a long history of
facing censorship by critics. One of
the most noted periods of censor-
ship in the United States began in
the 1870s after Congress passed the
Comstock Act, also known as the
Federal Anti-Obscenity Act. One
thing the legislation did was crimi-
nalize the publication of materials
deemed lewd, indecent, filthy or
obscene. (The Online Books Page,
2012) For decades, many books,
now considered to be classics, be-
came the target of the law, including
Chaucers Canterbury Tales and
Aristophanes Lysistrata. These
books and countless more were
yanked from library shelves after
being deemed inappropriate for one
reason or another. (The Online
Books Page, 2012) In one Missouri
town in the 1970s, a school board
even voted in favor of removing The
American Heritage Dictionary from
a school after a group of parents
complained it contained 39 objec-
tionable words. (Gold, 1994)
In 1982, one case put the
whole practice of banning books to
the test. The controversy began a
few years earlier when the Island
Trees Free School District Board in
New York decided to pull several
books from school library shelves,
claiming they were anti-American,
anti-Christian, anti-Semitic and just
plain filthy. (ALA, 2012) A group
of students argued the move violat-
ed their First Amendment rights.
They filed suit and the issue went to
court. In 1982, the Supreme Court
heard the case. In a close vote, 5-4,
the justices determined local school
boards could not remove books
solely because they disliked or disa-
greed with the ideas presented in the
texts. The justices ruled that doing
so violated (continued on p. 2)
Banned Books:
Censoring the Right to Read
Special points of interest:
Banned Books Week starts Monday, Sep-
tember 30th and runs through Saturday,
October 6th.
Books have a long history of being cen-
sored in the U.S.
Even today, critics challenge books in
schools and try to have them removed so
students cant access them.
Banned Books: Censoring the Right to Read 1
ALAs Top Challenged Books of 2011 2
Celebrating Banned Book Week 2
Banned Books: Censoring the Right to Read Contd. 2
Inside this issue:
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Volume 1, Issue 1
09/20/2012
students First Amendment rights. (Board
of Education, Island Trees Union Free School Dis-
trict v. Pico, 1982) The ruling, however, did not stop
books from being banned
period. The justices ruled
school systems still main-
tained some discretion over
the materials acquired in
the library, though the court
made a distinction that the
schools had limited power
to remove books already on
the shelves. The court also
found that school boards
could ban certain books
from being taught in the
classroom. (Board of Edu-
cation, Island Trees Union
Free School District v. Pi-
co, 1982)
Today, many books
still come under attack by
critics who disagree with
their content. The attacks
come in the form of a chal-
lenge, which the ALA de-
fines as a formal, written
complaint requesting a
book be removed from li-
brary shelves or school curriculum. The organization
says about 75 percent of all challenges are to material
in schools or school libraries. (ALA, 2012) The
ALAs Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) has rec-
orded more than 10,000 book challenges since 1990,
with nearly half of them being reported between 2001
and 2011. While thats a pretty large number, the OIF
says the number of challenges is likely much higher.
It estimates that less than a quarter of all challenges
are reported and recorded. (ALA, 2012)
The ALA notes that a challenge
doesnt simply involve a person expressing opinions
about a particular book. Rather, its an attempt to re-
strict or remove the materials
from free access. The ALA says
most attempts to get a book
pulled from the library shelves
are unsuccessful, however,
thanks to the commitment of
concerned librarians, parents,
students and teachers. Most peo-
ple who challenge a book do so
with the best of intentions-- usu-
ally to protect children from
coming in contact with difficult
ideas and information. (ALA,
2012) However, the ALA notes
censorship, no matter what the
intention, is always harmful.
There are countless rea-
sons out there that people
choose to challenge books these
days. Harper Lees To Kill a
Mockingbird has been on the
ALAs Most Challenged List
several years in a row due to its
offensive language and rac-
ism. Meanwhile, J.D. Salingers Catcher in the Rye
has been targeted because of its sexual references.
However, older books arent the only ones facing
challenges. Several recent popular books are also un-
der attack, including The Hunger Games series by
Suzanne Collins and the Harry Potter books by J.K.
Rowling. (ALA, 2012) Protecting a students right to
read is an ongoing battle across the country, one that
many people are willing to fight.
Page 2
Banned Books: Censoring the Right to Read, Continued
THE BOOK NOOK
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
ALAs 2011 Top Ten Challenged Books
In an effort to stand up against censorship, the school media center will be celebrating Banned Books Week
this year by making all the books on the ALAs Top Ten Challenged Books lists for the past ten years avail-
able to students. We will also hold a contest to see who can read the most banned books this month. Those
who choose to participate will submit a short essay on why they believe the books they read should or
shouldnt be available to students. The writers of the top five essays will win a special treat-- a pizza party in
the media center and a free banned book.
Celebrating Banned Book Week
VOLUME 1, ISSUE 1
American Library Association. (2012). Frequently Challenged Books of the 21
st
Century. Retrieved from
http://www.ala.org/advocacy/banned frequentlychallenged/21stcenturychallenged

American Library Association. (2012). Banned and/or Challenged Books from the Radcliffe Publishing
Course Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century. Retrieved from
http://www.ala.org/advocacy/banned/frequentlychallenged/challengedclassics/reasonsbanned

American Library Association. (2012). Letter to the Editor for Banned Books Week. Retrieved from
http://www.ala.org/advocacy/banned/bannedbooksweek/ideasandresources/letter_to_the_editor

Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District No. 26 v. Pico by Pico 457 U.S. 853. 1982. Re-
trieved from http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0457_0853_ZO.html

Gold, J.C., (1994). Board of Education v. Pico (1982). New York, NY: 21
st
Century Books.

Ockerbloom, J. M. (2012). The Online Books Page, Banned Books Online. Retrieved from http://
onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/banned-books.html



Page 3
References
Reprinted by permission of the American Library Association.