S1 Ep. 11 - The Right To Read

Today’s conversation is one where we will not all agree on, but important to understand. For many years, American schools have been pressured to restrict or deny student access to texts deemed objectionable content by some individual or group, resulting in book banning. Book banning is a form of censorship and the most wide-spread form in the United States. These pressures have mounted in recent years, and English teachers have no reason to believe they will diminish. The fight against censorship is a continuing series of skirmishes, not a battle leading to a final victory over censorship. This episode will focus on literary censorship and the right to read. Now, let’s start today’s conversation!

Transcript

Welcome to the True Talk Café Podcast Ep. 11 - The Right To Read

We can safely make two statements about censorship: first, suppression of ideas and information can occur at any stage or level of publication, distribution or institutional control, making it potentially open to attack by any individual, group, organization at any time for any reason; second, censorship is often arbitrary and irrational. Although, censorship is a violation of the First amendment right to freedom of speech there are limitations making it constitutionally permissible based on “community standards,” to apply. 

Most challenges and bans prior to the 1970s including those on traditional texts used in the English classrooms were, on the basis of, obscenity and explicit sexuality. Others for containing heretical, or subversive elements such as the following:

• Jules Verne’s Around the World in Eighty Days: “very unfavorable to Mormons”
• Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter: “a filthy book”
• Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick: “contains homosexuality”

Modern works, even more than the classics, are criticized with terms such as “filthy,” “un-American,” “overly realistic,” and “anti-war.” 

Show agenda:

• History of the Censorship?
• Guests Questions
  • Some books have been attacked merely for being “controversial,” suggesting that for some people the purpose of education is not the investigation of ideas but rather the indoctrination of a certain set of beliefs and standards. Do you agree with this statement?  Why or Why not?
  • Literature about minority, ethnic or racial groups remains “controversial” or “objectionable” to many adults. As long as groups such as African Americans, Pacific Islanders, American Indians, Asian Americans, and Latinxs “kept their proper place”—awarded them by a White society—censors rarely raised their voices. But attacks have increased in frequency as minority groups have refused to observe their assigned “place.” Why do you think minority literary content is perceived in this way?  How has your organization dealt with this specific area of opposition? 
  • In the opinion of many, books being banned are also books that help readers understand certain topics to a significant extent. When this happens students experience a narrowing of their world view and teachers are tasked with an ever-changing curriculum and fear of personal choice.  Does a strategy of ‘playing it safe’ with literary content put our young people in a position of social disadvantage?

• Survey Result:
  • This year’s Banned Book Week, Sept. 18-24, took place during an : time of book bans and challenges in U.S. schools.
  •  The subject matter most often banned? Four out of 10 banned books had LGBTQ+ characters or themes. Four out of 10 also had protagonists or characters of color.
  • Between July 2021 and June 2022, more than 2,500 book bans were enacted in 138 districts in 32 states, resulting in the removal of more than 1,600 titles from school libraries and classrooms that serve roughly 4 million students, according to a report by PEN America. And that’s likely an underestimate, as PEN America compiled only the bans reported to them or covered in the media.
  • The state with the most bans? Texas with 801.
    
    
  • Guest:
    • Shirley Robinson, Executive Director, Texas Library Association
      •  LI: @texaslibraryassociation
      •  FB: https://www.facebook.com/TexasLibraryAssociation
      •  IG: @txla_1902
      • Twitter: @TXLA
      • Advocacy Group:  https://texansfortherighttoread.com/ 

• Pod crew questions
  • Renee
  • Karla
  • Lollie
  • Anna

• Conclusion

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