Treasure Your Freedom to Read

1. 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

2. Banned Books Week • ALA poster Open a book, open your mind @ your library

3. First a bit about our Constitutional Rights to Intellectual Freedom • poster Open a book, open your mind @ your library

4. Intellectual freedom The ability to express and explore diverse opinion Open a book, open your mind @ your library

5. Intellectual freedom • Right to seek information Open a book, open your mind @ your library

6. Intellectual freedom • Right to choice information from all points of view Open a book, open your mind @ your library

7. Banned Book Week • Reminds Americans not to take this precious Right of Intellectual Freedom for granted. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

8. Why? • Freedom of speech and press require an understanding that others have different opinions and ideas. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

9. Freedom of Speech denied • However throughout world history, those with different ideas have been sought out and silenced. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

10. Book Burning • Books and libraries have been burned as a method of controlling thought and knowledge throughout world history. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

11. 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

12. 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

13. Still book burning happens today and …even in America. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

14. Fahrenheit 451 • by Ray BradburySet in the future when all books are banned, people called “firemen”burn 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 Open a book, open your mind @ your library

15. 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

16. 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

17. 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

18. 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

19. What is meant by altered? • “Objectionable words are erased • whiting or blacking out words • concealing or changing illustrations Open a book, open your mind @ your library

20. 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

21. Why are books challenged? • Sometimes books are challengedbecause they have offended someone. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

22. 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

23. Little House in the Big Woods • by Laura Ingalls WilderBanned for being "racially offensive" to Indians. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

24. 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

25. 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

26. Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret • by Judy Blume author of Tales of a Fourth Grade NothingIt’s about girl stuff…changing bodies and a girl’s search inchoosing a religion. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

27. 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 Association’s Library Bill of Rights Open a book, open your mind @ your library

28. 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

29. 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

30. Captain Underpants • By Pilkey, Dav challenged for encouraging childrento disobey grownups. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

31. Goosebumps (series) • by R. L. Stineoften challengedin libraries for their sometimes-violent content. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

32. We still have the freedom to read… Open a book, open your mind @ your library

33. 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

34. Where the Sidewalk Ends By Shel Silverstein • Challenged at the Central Columbia School District in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania., in 1993, because the poem “Dreadful,” which is about how “someone ate the baby,” encourages cannibalism. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

35. Where the Sidewalk Ends • By Shel Silverstein • challenged at the West Allis-West Milwaukee School Libraries in 1986 because it “suggests drug use, the occult, suicide, death, violence, disrespect for truth, disrespect for legitimate authority, rebellion against parents,” and at the Central Columbia School District in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania., in 1993, because the poem “Dreadful,” which is about how “someone ate the baby,” encourages cannibalism. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

36. Where the Wild Things Are • Maurice Sendak's classic Where the Wild Things Arehas been challenged for involving "witchcraft/supernatural elements." "witchcraft/supernatural elements." Open a book, open your mind @ your library

37. 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

38. 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

39. TarBeach • 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

40. 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

41. American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language • In 1978, an Eldon, Missouri library banned the dictionary because it contained 39 "objectionable" words. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

42. and the series most loved… Open a book, open your mind @ your library

43. 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

44. 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

45. So… I invite you to read a banned book. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

46. Veteran School Librarian Pat Scales • suggests that banned books have important lessons to teach youth. Open a book, open your mind @ your library

47. 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 Open a book, open your mind @ your library

48. 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.” Open a book, open your mind @ your library

49. 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

50. Boneville series By Jeff Smith • Challenged but retained in the Rosemount, Minn. Elementary School Libraries (2010) despite a parent’s concern that the series includes smoking, drinking, and gambling in its graphics and storyline. The series is rated suitable for fourth grade and up, has won several awards, and received positive reviews from national publications, including Time, which touted the series as the “best all-ages graphic novel ever published.” • Source: Newsletter on Intellectual Freedom July 2010, p. 175. Open a book, open your mind @ your library