Library and Book Ban News 4-11-24
Books removed from the Naval Academy library; State of American Libraries Report; much more
Hello Friends,
Last week I started separating the week’s library and book ban news into its own post. So this is just an FYI if you missed that. My goal is to post library and book ban news on Friday. The essays/book reviews, etc. will still post on Sunday.
This is National Library week. As usual, there’s a lot going on, but two things that I feel are most important: the removal of books from the Naval Academy library and the result in the American Libraries Report from the American Library Association that shows that only 16% of demands to censor books come from parents. So, let’s look at those two first.
The Nimitz Library collection
These Are the 381 Books Removed From the Naval Academy Library from the NYT (gift link)
The office of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the college to adhere to an executive order from President Trump banning educational material related to diversity, equity and inclusion topics.
This is the first time a U.S. college has banned books since PEN America started tracking this latest campaign of censorship across the country in 2021.
The Navy released the titles of 381 books on Friday evening that were removed from the U.S. Naval Academy’s Nimitz Library on the Annapolis, Md., campus this week because their subject matter was seen as being related to so-called diversity, equity and inclusion topics. …
First on the list is “How to Be Anti-Racist” by Ibram X. Kendi. Also listed are “The Making of Black Lives Matter,” by Christopher J. Lebron; “How Racism Takes Place,” by George Lipsitz; “The Fire This Time,” edited by Jesmyn Ward; “The Myth of Equality,” by Ken Wytsma; studies of the Ku Klux Klan, and the history of lynching in America.
The list also includes books about gender and sexuality, like “Bodies in Doubt: An American History of Intersex” by Elizabeth Reis, and “Between XX and XY: Intersexuality and the Myth of Two Sexes” by Gerald N. Callahan.
I had a look at the list. A small number of the entries are repeats of the same title (probably different editions, hardback v. Paperback, etc.), but it’s close to 380 removed titles. In addition to the books above, a few of the titles that caught my attention are:
Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong (Way back in 2009, I wrote about why I recommended this book to students.)
The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas. I plan to write a bit about this book in the near future. It’s excellent for readers and a lesson for writers.
America’s Original Sin: Racism, White Privilege, and a Bridge to a New America by Jim Wallis. Jim Wallis is the founder of Sojourners, a Christian left organization. I’ve read his books. This one’s about Christians’ call to overcome racism in American society.
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
There are many nonfiction titles on each of these topics:
The legacy of Jim Crow
African Americans’ contributions in WWII
The Ku Klux Klan (particularly in the 1920s)
Gender
There are smaller groups of books on these topics:
Race in college and professional sports
Lynching, policing, white supremacy
The intersection of religion and racial justice
In the ‘go figure’ category, there’s a surprising little group on gender and sexuality in
The Victorian period
A few each on the 18th century, medieval, and Elizabethan periods.
These seem like books for research for English majors such as Gender and Language in Chaucer or Henry James and Sexuality, plus books on Hemingway, Faulkner, Elizabeth Bishop, T.S. Eliot, Richard Wright, Thomas Pynchon, Anne Rice.
I picked these categories to show that the purpose of the book removals appears to be to
erase the histories of (particularly, the contributions of) Black and LGBTQ+ Americans
and that this was done by pulling books with specific keywords no matter what the book is actually about. Pulling books with the keyword ‘gender’ in the catalog record is why those books for English majors landed on the list.
In other words: there’s no justification for the removal of any of these books. This is what PEN America would call a part of an “ongoing campaign to eliminate views other than those it favors on race, equality and identities in schools and universities.”
With that in mind, I thought you might like to read this from the LA Times:
What she saw under Hitler, we can see under Trump by Jackie Calmes
Political theorist Hannah Arendt came of age in Germany as Hitler took power. Her lessons have a chilling resonance today.
Comparing Hitler and the Nazis to Donald Trump and his MAGA movement is of course fraught. Trump’s world war is a bloodless one over trade; his lawless roundups of migrants and domestic enemies aim to deport, not exterminate.
And yet the parallels are undeniable. That was dramatically clear this week when I participated in a preview and discussion of a documentary on the life of German American Hannah Arendt, the Jewish survivor and chronicler of Nazi totalitarianism. (The film, “Hannah Arendt: Facing Tyranny,” will air on PBS on June 27.) …
In a last speech before her death in 1975, Arendt warned that totalitarian governments try to rewrite or bury history to suit them. Americans must resist, she said, “for it was the greatness of this republic to give due account, for the sake of freedom, to the best in man and to the worst.” (Emphasis mine)
According to The Hill, Reps. Adam Smith (Wash.), ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, and Chrissy Houlahan (Pa.), ranking member of the Armed Services Military Personnel Subcommittee, sent letters to the secretaries of the Army, Navy and Air Force on Monday demanding answers after the Naval Academy said it removed the books from the Nimitz Library collection.
And here’s our second big topic:
American Library Association kicks off National Library Week with the Top 10 Most Challenged Books of 2024 and the State of America’s Libraries Report from the American Library Association
CHICAGO – The American Library Association (ALA) today released the highly anticipated Top 10 Most Challenged Books List as part of the 2025 State of America’s Libraries Report that highlights the ways libraries continue to meet the needs of their communities amid challenges to intellectual freedom.
New data reported to ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) shows that the majority of book censorship attempts are now originating from organized movements. Pressure groups and government entities that include elected officials, board members and administrators initiated 72% of demands to censor books in school and public libraries. Parents only accounted for 16% of demands to censor books, while 5% of challenges were brought by individual library users. (Emphasis mine) The 120 titles most frequently targeted for censorship during 2024 are all identified on partisan book rating sites which provide tools for activists to demand the censorship of library books. …
Below are the Top 10 Most Challenged Books of 2024:
1. “All Boys Aren't Blue,” by George M. Johnson
2. “Gender Queer,” by Maia Kobabe
3. (TIE) “The Bluest Eye,” by Toni Morrison
3. (TIE) “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” by Stephen Chbosky
5. “Tricks,” by Ellen Hopkins
6. (TIE) “Looking for Alaska,” by John Green
6. (TIE) “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl,” by Jesse Andrews
8. (TIE) “Crank,” by Ellen Hopkins
8. (TIE) “Sold,” by Patricia McCormick
10. “Flamer,” by Mike Curato
The most common justifications for censorship provided by complainants were false claims of illegal obscenity for minors; inclusion of LGBTQIA+ characters or themes; and covering topics of race, racism, equity, and social justice.
ALA cites the following factors contributing to the decrease in documented censorship from 2023:
Underreporting – Many book challenges are not publicly reported or covered by the press; therefore, ALA’s year-end data only represents a snapshot of censorship in America. …
Censorship by Exclusion – This occurs when library workers are prohibited from purchasing books, or required to place books in restricted or less accessible areas of the library due to fear of controversy. …
Legislative restrictions – Several states have passed laws restricting the type of materials available in libraries and schools based on the ideas or topics addressed in the materials.
NOTE: This list is somewhat different from PEN’s recent banned books list, which measures a different time frame (the 2023-24 school year).
Other News
Banned Together is now streaming on Apple TV+.
The film pulls back the curtain on two of the most controversial issues in America today: book bans and curriculum censorship in public schools. Banned Together follows three students and their adult allies as they fight to reinstate 97 books suddenly pulled from their school libraries. As they evolve from local to national activists – meeting with bestselling/banned authors, politicians, Constitutional experts, and more – the film reveals the dark forces behind the accelerating wave of book bans in the U.S.
A WORD WITH ELLEN HOPKINS: BANNED TOGETHER FILM HIGHLIGHTS BANNED BOOKS From Slug Magazine
I mentioned that Hopkins has the greatest number of banned books. Pretty much all of her books are banned somewhere.
Colorado lawmakers approve new rules for schools facing calls to remove books from CPR News
The Colorado House approved a measure Thursday [April 3] that would increase protections for school libraries and librarians when there are calls to remove books from shelves.
Senate Bill 25-063 requires school districts and charter operators to draft formal policies that state when books can be removed and lay out the steps to challenge them. The measure also says library personnel can’t be fired or punished for choosing a book or refusing to remove it without a review. Finally, the measure says only parents of children in the school can request a book be removed, and a book can be challenged only once every two years.
Federal appeals court orders temporary hold on returning of banned books to Colorado school district from CBS News
It seems there are twists and turns weekly with the Elizabeth School District book bans. According to Colorado Public Radio, “the case began in December when the American Civil Liberties Union sued the 2,600-student district after the school board voted to remove the 19 books from school libraries last fall. The plaintiffs in the case include two students, a chapter of the NAACP, and the Authors Guild, a professional organization for writers.”
A federal appeals court has ordered a temporary hold on a previous federal judge's order for a Colorado school district to put books back on shelves after the district banned several books from its schools. …
It's unclear how long the appeals process could take, but both the plaintiffs -- two school district parents, the Author's Guild, and the NAACP of Colorado, Montana, and Wyoming -- and the school district could be required to respond to several rounds of questions or requests for clarifications before the appeals court makes a final ruling. At that point, the case could then be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which would need to agree to hear the case.
The books in question include:
"The Hate U Give" by Angie Thomas
"Beloved" by Toni Morrison
"The Bluest Eye" by Toni Morrison
"The Kite Runner" by Khaled Hosseini
"You Should See Me in a Crown" by Leah Johnson
"#Pride: Championing LGBTQ Rights" by Rebecca Felix
"George" (now published and referred to as "Melissa") by Alex Gino
"It's Your World—If You Don't Like It, Change It" by Mikki Halpin
"The Perks of Being a Wallflower" by Stephen Chbosky
"Thirteen Reasons Why" by Jay Asher
"Looking for Alaska" by John Green
"Nineteen Minutes" by Jodi Picoult
"Crank" by Ellen Hopkins
"Glass" by Ellen Hopkins
"Fallout" by Ellen Hopkins
"Identical" by Ellen Hopkins
"Burned" by Ellen Hopkins
"Smoke" by Ellen Hopkins
"Redwood and Ponytail" by K.A. Holt
AB 416 aims to ban book bans in Nevada’s public institutions from the Tahoe Daily Tribune
The bill would protect the freedom to read and staff’s freedom to manage library content without political or ideological interference. It would also introduce criminal penalties for anyone who tries to intimidate or harm others over library materials in public schools, public libraries, library districts, and institutions of higher education.
Children’s Book Reviews: The Freedom to Read from The Arts Fuse
Reviews of two new middle grade books about the dangers of book banning