It’s Banned Book Week! There are many ways that you can fight and support banned books. Here are a few:
*Read banned books. By purchasing banned books, you support authors, their literary estates and their publishers. You also encourage vendors to promote banned books and make them more visible within their offerings. Check out a banned book from your local library, thereby demonstrating your support and interest in banned books.
*Listen to a banned book. There are wonderful audio recordings that can easily be downloaded through whatever app you use to access audio. Many are “free” through Hoopla and Libby. Thanks to our libraries!
*Create a banned book club. I did that about a year ago and we have been having a terrific time rediscovering classics we read in many cases when we were young with new eyes as we bring our life experience to these books. For example, we just read Animal Farm, George Orwell’s incendiary classic, which is definitely not just for high schoolers. It’s brilliance teaches us valuable historical lessons that are sadly applicable to what’s happening right now. Other books we’ve read this past year include Catcher in the Rye, Gender Queer, The Bluest Eye, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, and Looking for Alaska. Our next selection is The Perks of Being a Wallflower.
As a start, you can download lists of banned books from Pen American, the American Library Association, and other sources.
*Support organizations that fight book bans, such as EveryLibrary, Unite Against Book Bans, Pen America, the American Library Association, the Freedom to Read Foundation, the Authors Guild, the National Book Foundation, the National Council of Teachers of English, and the Steve and Loree Potash Family Foundation.
Publishers Weekly recently reported that middle schoolers are reading less. While there are many factors for this decline, one may be the reduced availability of books in classrooms, school libraries, local libraries and bookstores.
I hope that you’ll join me in fighting this important fight!
–Joelle Delbourgo