Censorship-Banned and Challenged Books By: William Eddy and Marcus Salvadore By: William Eddy and Marcus Salvadore

What is Censorship? Censorship, as Henry Reichman once said, is “The removal, suppression, or restricted circulation of literary, artistic or educational material......on the grounds that these are morally or otherwise objectionable in light of standards applied by the censor.” There are many types of censorship, including political, military, and moral censorship, which involves the banning and removal of certain books in schools, libraries, and even countries.

When did this start? The first banning of books occurred in Germany approximately 40 years after the invention of the printing press in c Ever since then, books have been censored for various reasons; the Catholic Church, in particular, created the Index Librorum Prohibitorium, the first known published list of censored books and probably the mosy notorious

How has this changed? Even though the past has shown that the persecution of certain materials has lead to terrible things, books are still forbidden in places all across America for some of the stupidest reasons. Instead of someone trying to ban a book from a school or library, they will now “challenge” the novel(s) that they wish to be removed from said place. The most popular reasons for banning books in America are: profanity/violence, sex, discrimination, witchcraft, and homosexuality.

Surprising/Often Challenged Books and the Reasoning Behind Them Dictionary- certain publications of the resource have been forbidden in a California elementary school because of its definition of oral sex A Light in the Attic- the poetry compilation was banned from a Florida elementary school because “it promotes disrespect, horror, and violence. The Diary of a Young Girl- Anne Frank’s diary has been banned several times for sexually explicit and homosexual themes

Surprising/Often Challenged Books and the Reasoning Behind Them (cont.) Sylvester and the Magic Pebble- twelve states tried to ban this book because it portrayed police officer’s as pigs, even though everyone else in the children’s book is an animal in 1981, this novel was challenged in Florida for being pro- Communist and containing sexually explicit material Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland- banned in the Hunan province in China for having personified animals acting on the same intellectual level as humans The Da Vinci Code- banned in Lebanon after its Catholic officials deemed it “offensive to christianity” Adventures of Huckleberry Finn- banned for the use of “the ‘n’ word” in multiple schools an libraries across America; the NAACP supported this ban because they found the book racist and offensive

The Pico Case In 1975, members of the Island Trees School District Board of Education in Long Island, NY created a list of books that they thought should be banned from the district; some titles included Go Ask Alice and Slaughterhouse Five. Eventually, the Supreme Court voted 5 to 4 in favor of Steven Pico, the leader of a student alliance trying to get the books back on the shelf. Since the Pico decision, unfortunately, the decision of these cases was usually on the side of the school board.

“Banned and Burned in America” Banned Books Week takes place from September 24 to October 1 and celebrates our First Amendment right to freedom of speech. This is an annual event and is used to highlight the danger of censoring books. The term “burned” is used because in ancient times, when works were hand-scribed, the few copies that there were of certain banned books were destroyed, usually by burning. After the invention of the printing press in c.1450, the destruction of all copies of a book would be practically impossible.