Banned Books Week

[seekingferret.livejournal.com]

The ALA's Banned Books Week is coming up in a few weeks. It falls September 26th- October 3rd. More information can be found here: http://www.bannedbooksweek.org/ .

I was wondering which banned books are written by authors of color. The ALA's list of banned or challenged classics here cites Alice Walker's The Color Purple, Toni Morrison's Beloved and Song of Solomon, Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God, Ralph Ellison's The Invisible Man, Richard Wright's Native Son, James Baldwin's Go Tell It On the Mountain, and Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses. Given the relative paucity of books by authors of color in the Western Canon, it's kind of shocking (and yet, not really surprising) that nearly all of them have been banned or challenged at some point.

And this is the ALA's list of banned or challenged books from just the last year: Right here. I started typing out the authors of color on this list, but there are a lot of them and so I figure it's better to send you to the source.

Banned Books Week is about focusing attention on the way liberal democracy is shaped around the ideas of an informed, open-minded populace. It's designed to remind us that the First Amendment really is the cornerstone of the American way of life. Growing up the son of a librarian, Banned Books Week is more important in my house than Christmas (well, I'm Jewish). I encourage all of us to seek out banned books during the week and especially banned books by authors of color.

And if anybody else knows books by authors of color that have been banned, please post them.

Comments

[sanguinity]

The lists I compiled in 2007.

Commentary in my journal on that list, from the same year.

[sanguinity]

And now that I've scanned over this year's list...

I have become less enamored with the ALA list each year, in large part because people discuss it as if it is a list of banned or almost-banned books, and as if books could only get on that list for evil reasons. (Yes, this is a shift in opinion from the 2007 commentary that I linked.) The ALA list is more accurately a list of books that parents have raised flags about, typically within a specific context. F'rex, Huckleberry Finn showing up on the list this year (as it often does), is within the specific context of teaching it in a high school classroom, where everyone must read and discuss it, and where its nasty racial stereotypes could (and often do) slide by unchallenged in favor of emphasizing the anti-slavery aspects of the book. In my opinion, whether and how to teach it in class, especially when there are many other worthy alternatives, is an absolutely appropriate conversation to have.

I do agree that a lot of books make it onto the list for worrisome reasons, and that the ALA must have Banned Books Week in order to counter the chilling effect of the sheer hassle of trying to keep worthy, but frequently-challenged, books on the shelves. Unfortunately, the challengers tend to uniformly come off as demons during Banned Books Week, when some of them are attempting to initiate good faith discussions about how educational time should be best spent, and to what purpose.

[seekingferret.livejournal.com]

It's a fair point, and one I can't really argue with. It's the reason I carefully used the phrase "banned or challenged" to describe the list. I'm aware that not all of these situations are equal, and that the ALA's ideological position that no book should ever be denied to anyone drives this list. (However, I have had contact with the kind of parent involved in these things, and I'm inclined to be less generous to them than you are)

I don't think we're in disagreement that often when parents challenge books by authors of color, they're doing so because of discomfort with some part of how the authors of color are presenting the world.

I'll get back to you on Huckleberry Finn when I have a coherent opinion about it. I think it's a very difficult book that presents many problems to the modern reader. I think it absolutely should be read anyway, because it offers the strongest articulation ever written of many important American ideals. And I think it's probably better that the reading take place in a guided context like a school classroom than an unguided context more likely to foster misreadings. But I do understand the position you invoke that would rather spend classroom time on books that don't require as much sensitive negotiation to get through.

[sanguinity]

:: (However, I have had contact with the kind of parent involved in these things, and I'm inclined to be less generous to them than you are) ::

My generosity comes more from principle than experience; almost every challenge on the list this year makes me roll my eyes, and some of them make me snarl. However, I believe that there are scenarios where it is worthy to lead with principle, which is why I'm emphasizing the could over the is.

:: I don't think we're in disagreement that often when parents challenge books by authors of color, they're doing so because of discomfort with some part of how the authors of color are presenting the world. ::

I wholly agree. I'd also add that said disagreement is a feature, and one of the things that make the books worth teaching.

:: I'll get back to you on Huckleberry Finn when I have a coherent opinion about it. ::

Take your time, although if we go into it at any length, maybe we should move that discussion off-comm, what with Mr. Clemens being a white author and all.