Evan Rogers

October 1-7 is Banned Book Week and Abington’s annual  Banned Book Reading will be held on Sutherland Plaza’s Upper Patio on October 4 from 12:20-1:20.  There will be seating set up on the patio and a table with banned books that students will read passages from.  Professor Matthew Rigilano will be hosting the event.  Anyone interested in free speech and the literature protected under the 1st Amendment are encouraged to attend.

Banned Book Week this year is especially significant as there has been a rise in demands to have certain books censored. According to the American Library Association (ALA), 2022 saw a record high of 2,571 challenges or bans to unique titles. The previous year saw 1,858 book titles targeted. In 2020, there were 223.  The ALA defines a book challenge as “an attempt to remove or restrict materials, based upon the objections of a person or group.” 2022 wasn’t a unique year for challenging books, it was part of a growing trend.

PEN America, a non profit focused on free speech and literature, lists 1,477 books that have been banned in the first half of the 2022-23 school year.  A banning is the removal of books and materials from a curriculum or library.  Since PEN started tracking cases in July 2021, they have recorded 4,000 books that have been banned.

“Ed Scare” is what the rising demand for book bans is being called.  PEN America, states it’s, “a campaign to foment anxiety and anger with the goal of suppressing free expression in public education.”  PEN has reported  Texas, Florida, Missouri, Utah and South Carolina have seen the most bans this year.

The current culture wars in America are targeting specific kinds of books. A study by PEN America shows in 2021-22 that 41% of the banned books had LGBTQ themes, protagonists, or secondary characters. 40% of the banned books had protagonists or prominent secondary characters of color, limiting students’ range of information from different perspectives.

The Banned Books Event is a celebration of First Amendment freedoms, including the freedom of access to reading materials.  First amendment law expert, David L. Hudson Jr. a professor at Belmont University College of Law, states, “Book bans violate the First Amendment because they deprive children and students of the right to receive information and ideas.”

Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom states, “This is a dangerous time for readers and public servants who provide access to reading materials. Readers, particularly students, are losing access to critical information, and librarians and teachers are under attack for doing their jobs.”

The Banned Book Event on October 4 is a defiant celebration opposing suppression of reading materials and the teachers and librarians who provide those materials to expand our thinking.