#BannedBooksWeek 2015
September 27 – October 3, 2015 is Banned Books Week, sponsored by the American Library Association.
While many of the most frequently challenged titles fall under the fiction genre, a few non-fiction titles have caused great debate over the years as well. The Library of Congress exhibition on the Books That Shaped America included a fair number of texts which have been banned and/or challenged. Two of these titles can be found in the Crerar Bookstacks: 1) Alfred C. Kinsey, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (1948) and 2) Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, Our Bodies, Ourselves (1971). To learn more about the challenges against these books, check out this article from www.bannedbooksweek.org.
How many #bannedbooks have you read? This interactive timeline celebrating 30 years of liberating literature highlights challenged novels and children’s books. The American Library Association Office for Intellectual Freedom has lists of banned books by year or decade. Importantly, the ALA OIF does not claim comprehensiveness in recording challenges and has only been collecting data about banned books since 1990. Check the library catalog and challenge yourself to read a banned book today.
