Censorship doesn’t always have to be loud, like a towering plume of smoke from a blazing stack of controversial books. It can be quieter, like technically checking the box of including diverse literary works, but hiding those books from plain view, or never purchasing them at all. The problem isn’t simply in the silence that’s been created, but stretches out into stifling introductions to different voices and ideas.
Banned Books Week, is organized by the American Library Association and typically held during the last full week in September. This year it was Sept. 22-28. It raises awareness about censorship by highlighting the importance of free and open access to information and offering data on challenges and bans to books and to informational resources in libraries. Last year, the association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom tracked a 65 percent increase in these kinds of censorship efforts. While that number has declined in 2024—with 414 attempts to censor library materials and services and challenges to more than 1,100 titles—it’s still outpacing what the numbers were just four years ago.
Kasey Meehan is the program director for Freedom to Read at PEN America, a nonprofit that works at the intersection of human rights, literature, and defending free expression. Christine Emeran is the director of the Youth Free Expression program at the National Coalition Against Censorship, which provides direct intervention for people experiencing censorship in their communities. Meehan and Emeran took some time to talk about some of the history in this week-long recognition, some of the effects of censorship and some of the victories against it. (These interviews have been edited for length and clarity. )
Q: Banned Books Week began in 1982; can you talk about the history of book bans and what was happening in 1982, particularly with regard to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in the case of the Island Trees Union Free School District v. Pico at the time?
Emeran: My understanding is that the 1980s mirrored what we’re seeing today. The big difference between then and now is that schools didn’t have challenge policies implemented, so I know the NCAC and other organizations took it upon themselves to develop guidelines, work with educational institutions on formalizing the process of field requests and assembling a review committee to review books, and then advising a community on what to do with a challenge to a book.
Many of the reasons for challenges were kind of what we’re seeing today, in of parents being worried about the content of particular books. I think that had been addressed in being able to make sure parents’ concerns were being heard and communities’ concerns that there would be transparency in the process for how these challenges were being fielded. The outcome of this kind of organizational work was really to institute challenge policies and that seemed to be working quite well. Communities would institute these policies and you can fast forward to today where most school districts have a policy for this sort of thing, so they were successful in adopting this. That seemed to be OK up until 2021. Before, it was more of a local matter and wasn’t necessarily a news event.
To get into the history of what was going on and why they needed to have a challenge policy, the Supreme Court case saw high school students concerned that their First Amendment rights were being violated and that books were being removed based on their viewpoint or their content. These books were being removed from the shelves and there wasn’t really any process for doing that. At the time, the Supreme Court decided that the schools had the right to set the curriculum, but they also couldn’t interfere with the right of students to be able to read material and discuss it. What we find today is that it’s not so much the schools deciding this anymore as it’s the states instituting policies that override what the school communities were deciding what was appropriate. They’ve kind of taken over in of creating laws that harm minors and target LGBTQ books, laws that dictate gender and sexuality, targeting diverse concepts that tend target BIPOC communities, anti-critical race theory policies that disrupted African-American studies in states like Florida. While the solution in the 1980s was to institute a process for challenges (to books), the problem now is that state laws can kind of override policies for reviewing the books. A lot of these books are being taken off the shelves preemptively because the schools don’t want to be in violation of state law.
Meehan: I’m not a historian, but for broad strokes purposes, PEN America has also been tracking this given that we’re a 100-year-old organization. We have looked at different trends, similar trends to what the American Library Association tracks, as well. Book bans have a place in this country that is kind of cyclical. We have incredible authors, like Judy Blume and Margaret Atwood, who can talk about the first time their books were banned in the ’70s and ’80s and ’90s. So, there is this cyclical aspect around book bans that we have been able to track throughout history.
The case that you mentioned is one of those foundational cases that set some really important precedent that we also refer to around book bans, particularly in public schools and public libraries. In this case, it was a student that was challenging book bans in their in their high school. What comes out of that is the defense of public schools and public libraries and places where students and patrons can access information, and where narrow, ideological viewpoints cannot be imposed to restrict certain types of books. That precedent and those values that were taken on in that case continue to be the values that we fight for today.
My sense is that a lot of this had roots in Christian extremism that has these very narrow viewpoints of what young people should or should not have access to in their public schools. That’s often where we see these peaks in book banning, is when these moments of morality scare come up and you have individuals who are increasingly concerned about what information young people are accessing. They want to delineate what’s appropriate for younger people and students, and what is not. A lot of that looks at certain representations in certain stories-whether it’s violence, sex, sexual violence, LGBTQ-plus representation and themes, books about race and racism, books that feature characters of color-and those tend to be the targets of book banning.
Q: What is often mentioned in the banning of books is the desire to protect children from indoctrination and topics deemed inappropriate for young readers. However, the majority of books challenged or banned feature stories that center LGBTQ-plus characters and characters of color. What are the risks that come from limiting information access in this way, particularly for children?
Emeran: I think critical thinking and also empathy because if students aren’t exposed to different cultures and different ways of life, it stymies their ability to come up with solutions or to cooperate with others because they’re not able to understand other ways of life. From what I can tell from speaking with students is that there is an impact on them feeling alone because they don’t feel represented in the books that they read. A particular book might offer them some kind of that they’re not receiving in their community, so it has individual effects. It’s also harmful in that students are not developing critical thinking skills, they’re not getting a broad perspective of how the world works and learning to understand how to navigate the world once they enter into it. We can’t override parents, they get to decide for their children, but by removing books from schools students don’t get multiple perspectives on different issues.
Meehan: The risks are so large. In some ways, it’s hard to even put appropriate words behind it. (Recently) I was on a call with a colleague at We Need Diverse Books and they always point to the fact that students who access more culturally diverse and culturally representative learning materials learn more, they read more. In of educational advancement, having classrooms that look like our diverse society, and the learning materials that students are exposed to is critically important for interest and for keeping students engaged in learning along the way. So, that’s a big factor. I think there’s also this piece around, you know, so much of this information also advances empathy. To learn about somebody else’s lived experience, to learn about a community’s history that may be different from yours, these are all ways that we use books and other learning materials to build empathy so that we can all live amongst each other in our democratic society. I think increasingly removing those books that offer windows into other people’s experiences is harmful.
Q: In what ways do these book bans undermine our collective rights?
Emeran: If we think about this in of a democracy and all of us as individuals having the right to read and access information, it’s stifled in the sense that you can’t choose what you’d like to read because the books are being curated for you. When you go to school, there’s an assumption that the professionals who are librarians have judgement and they can be trusted to curate for the community. Those books being offered in the library have already been vetted because these are librarians, they do research, they don’t pick books that aren’t for school. So, in some ways, you’re undermining their judgement as professionals who did go to school, who do understand what belongs in schools and what doesn’t. That’s unfortunate. There’s also a chilling effect because you might have librarians not choose books because they think it might create a controversy at their school, so they’d prefer not to lose their jobs or be the center of that kind of attention.
It can also mean that you’re erasing marginalized stories because they’re not being included in your collection. It targets minority identities which can make those kids feel like there’s something wrong with them in of who they are. If you’re exploring your identity, you may not want your parents to know that you’re exploring a particular part of your identity. That’s the risk of censorship, too, because it’s restricting the material which might also bring stigma to that student who’s wondering why that’s being censored. We’ve had students who’ve experienced sexual assault and feeling alone, and then read a book about it that actually helped them overcome what they were going through. Some of those students may not have the ability to communicate with their families, or they may not have access to therapy, but to have a story of a person who’s gone through a similar situation can be a lifesaver for them because they see that it’s happened to someone else and here’s how they dealt with it. Most of the books that are being challenged right now are because of content about LGBTQ-plus issues or about race, and these are the people who need because they’re marginalized.
Meehan: Certainly, I think that’s where we’re seeing a lot of the legal challenges show up, even to this current wave of book banning. PEN America is actively arguing that these are unconstitutional bans on the right of individuals to access information, the right of individuals to read, the right of individuals to learn, the right of educational spaces provide equal education to all of their students in a way that each student has an opportunity to see themselves in their curriculum and the content of the classroom. There are many ways to think about the ways in which our rights are being restricted by this, but with students at the center of this, we are arguing that their right to free expression, their right to read, those are absolutely being restricted. Then, many other groups are also calling out what this means for educational opportunity, for families, for parents, for educators who are feeling increasingly restricted by what they can offer in their classrooms. This entire wave of sort of educational censorship is challenging all of that.
Q: In what ways do censorship and banning books impact a culture? How do you see it impacting us, culturally?
Meehan: Personally, I went to a Catholic school where part of our learning was very much through the lens of Catholicism-it abstinence only and there wasn’t a lot of LGBTQ representation-so how much later in life did I have to get to have exposure and information to communities and ideas and health and safety practices? We see that playing out in many different ways. We hear from students all the time about what it means when they are able to talk about structural racism in the classroom, or what it means to students if they don’t feel that their teachers can them because they are queer and, according to state or district policy, aren’t able to use their preferred pronouns. There are such big implications on our cultural well-being. What do we want to learn? What do we want to teach one another? What is important for us to know now so that we can move toward a place where social justice is increasingly attainable? In some ways, we’re putting the brakes on for a lot of that momentum; that’s what it feels like, at least. It feels like there are real barriers to recent progress around how see each other’s humanity and learn from mistakes of the past and present.
Q: Last year, California ed a law that banning book bans and textbook censorship in schools. What have been some successful ways to combat repressive activities like book bans?
Emeran: For us, what we’ve been seeing is that it makes a big difference in reporting the challenges to books and getting the needed to address it. For example, people will report these instances to us, we’re writing letters, and they’re taking them to school board meetings. For those that read the letters at school board meetings, we’ve been seeing a difference in changing minds and outcomes of these particular challenges. Our letters are signed with our partners, like PEN America and other organizations, and we’re able to notify people in the community that there’s an school board meeting and they can attend the meeting with other ers and speak about the book. I think that’s been helpful. Media attention, stories, petitions, on-the-ground events that have drawn attention also make a difference. There’s a lot of litigation going on right now, so people who are just taking the books off of shelves without telling anyone, that causing them to pause and realize that’s a First Amendment issue and they might find themselves included in a lawsuit if they continue these kinds of practices.
There are also other states introducing legislation to stop book bans, so there’s a push. From the polling, most people don’t like books being banned, so we’ve been doing a lot of advocacy. There are communities unseating school board and electing candidates who are pro-books. So, advocacy is number one, speaking out on this issue and ing a broader type of education that includes everyone.
Meehan: Yes, California is a great example. We’ve seen similar pieces of legislation in states like Illinois and Maryland, as well. We have seen a lot of state elected leaders get to a place where they can introduce similar legislation, so there are ways that state leaders can take a role. These like freedom to read act bills that you know colloquially will say they like ban book banning, the banning of books on these narrow, ideological perspectives we have seen, you know, a lot of state elected leaders take, you know, that place where they can you know, similar legislation has been introduced in Colorado, not yet signed, but I think we see Rhode Island is another state where legislation has been introduced, so there’s definitely, you know, ways that state leaders can take a role. Here we see what’s also happening at the federal level. (U.S. Rep. Maxwell Alejandro) Frost has introduced the Fight Book Bans Act, which would reimburse school districts that end up spending a lot of money in the review process of books to retain and keep books available to students. (U.S. Rep. Ayanna) Presley has introduced the Books Save Lives Act, which encourages districts to put books on shelves that are representative, demographically, of the student population. There are lots of state and federal legislative efforts that are certainly moving forward.
