Above: A list of book bans by state (PEN America). There are bans in 138 school districts in 32 states that represent 5,049 schools with nearly 4 million students.
What is going on with all these states and schools banning books?
How can teachers use this as a "teachable moment" and educate students about the long history of censorship inside and outside schools?
There is a long history of humans banning or destroying books that they find objectionable. Of course, one of the most infamous acts of book burning included those of the Nazis during their rise to power in the 1930s. Similarly, segregationists during the modern Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s and 60s attempted to ban books from local libraries and schools.
Sadly, we again face attempts to censor what people, and especially students, read. A number of conservative states in the U.S. have passed laws that curtail what books can be included in schools and many school boards have banned books from their school libraries. These laws have largely targeted books related to race, sexual orientation, and transgender people (and are part of a concerted effort by conservatives to control the content taught in schools). In response, educators and community members have been challenging these laws.
This blog post is to help social studies teachers contextualize these book bans through lessons for their students on the history of book bans.
Above: Book burning depicted in the 1493 Nuremberg Chronicles. Below: (Left) The 1817 Wartburg Festival in Germany, where anti-nationalist writings were burned. (Right) Segregationists in the 20th century often supported bans and burnings related to books about racial justice or written by authors of color.
Book Bans Spread from Europe to the Americas
As long as there have been books, there have been attempts by people to ban or destroy them. There were incidences of book burnings in ancient Rome, Egypt, and China. There were at least 200 book burnings during the Medieval period in Europe.
Traditionally, book burnings have been mostly symbolic acts to further the cause of banning books. With the invention of the printing press and books being more readily available, book bans increased. For example, during the Reformation, Pope Paul IV banned books by authors
guilty of heresy against the Catholic Church, including Martin Luther, John Calvin, Henry
VIII, and others. The first book banning in what became the United
States was likely in 1637 at Manet (now Quincy) in Massachusetts Bay Colony and continued through much of the 17th and 18th centuries.
Book Bans to Prevent Increasing Justice and Freedom
Above: Anti-slavery book Uncle Tom's Cabin was banned and even burned in many places before the Civil War.
In the 19th and 20th centuries, as more people facing oppression demanded their rights, book bans increased in the United States. Anti-slavery books were banned in many locations throughout the United States in the 19th century, and especially in slave states. For instance, Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe was publicly burned by slaveholders. Free Black minister Sam Greenwas was sentenced to 10 years in a Maryland penitentiary for owning a copy of the book.
After the Civil War, with the passage of the Comstock Act (1873), possession or mailing of "obscene" or "immoral" texts became illegal; these laws often targeted queer people and women, as they included articles about sexuality and birth control. In Boston (where I live), the New England Watch and Ward Society was created in 1879 to push for the banning of books throughout in the area (it helped give the rise to the phrase "banned in Boston"); to their dismay, some publishers specifically chose to publish their books in the city in the hopes that it would get banned and raise publicity. During the anti-communism hysteria of the early 1950s, communities banned numerous books including Huckleberry Finn, The Catcher in the Rye, and To Kill a Mockingbird.
In the 1950s and 60s, at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, the anti-war movement, and the sexual revolution, schools became the front link for book bans. The United Daughters of the Confederacy waged successful campaigns to ban textbooks that were not sympathetic to the Confederacy (here is an excellent story from The Root showing how many current congressmen used those textbooks). Those opposed to the Civil Rights Movement banned books about racial justice and written from Black perspectives (something that started decades earlier, including the banning of Carter G. Woodson's work). They also burned books, including the plea for racial equality "We Sing for America" by Marion Cuthbert. Meanwhile, segregationists also prevented Black people from borrowing books from public libraries.
Above: (Right) A comic book and magazine burning in 1949 at St. Mary's High School in Cape
Girardeau, Missouri. (Left) Elementary teachers cover bookshelves in
2023 after Manatee County School District officials direct them to
remove all books that have not been approved by a specialist to ensure
they do not violate a new Florida state law
that censors the content of school books.
Schools (and school-aged children) have often been the target of book bans and burnings. Due to their perceived innocence, book bans that are framed as "protecting children" often face less resistance from communities. Yet, these book bans have often targeted books that are actually uplifting to students of color and queer students, or help students understand issues related to race, sexual orientation, or gender.
During this period, there were also several important federal and Supreme Court cases that prohibited school officials from removing books from school libraries (Minarcini v. Strongsville City School District and Island Trees School District v. Pico) or preventing student journalists from reporting on controversial topics (Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier). Much of these rulings we based on a 1933 Supreme Court ruling that struck down bans of the James Joyce book "Ulysses." Yet, there have continued to be so many contested books in school libraries that librarians have established the annual "Banned Book Week."
Book Bans Today
Book bans and burnings are not unique to the United States, but they have made a comeback in recent years. The nonprofit organization PEN America found that 1,586 book bans targeting 1,145 unique books had occurred in 2022. So-called "divisive concept" or anti-Critical Race Theory laws have give new tools to conservative politicians to remove books related to racial justice or queer peoples' experiences.
Moms for Liberty, a dark money funded astroturf group, has been one of the groups leading the charge to ban books at the district and state levels (while also strategically placing conservative political propaganda in some of those same school libraries and generally lobbying against public education). A similar campaign is under way from other conservative political organizations to influence history and civics curriculum around conservative political ideologies.
An important aspect to
book bans or burnings is that they usually do not work (yet, they do sometimes have a silencing effect in the short term-and there should be a concern that these bans may be different). Ultimately, they
may encourage more people to read a banned or burned book, especially in
the digital age, where it is much easier to get access to reading
materials. For example, an Arkansas lawmaker tried to ban Howard Zinn's A Peoples History of the United States, and it likely led to more students reading the book. After some school districts attempted to ban "Stamped" by Ibram Kendi and Jason Reynolds, book sales skyrocketed.
Below are several editorials and campaigns against book bans. Have students read these various perspectives as they consider the potential harm caused by book bans.
"The Real Reason North Dakota Is Going After Books and Librarians" by Taylor Brorby (New York Times) https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/24/opinion/libraries-sex-books-north-dakota.html
"How to Beat a Book Ban: Students, Parents and Librarians Fight Back" by Adam Gabbatt (The Guardian) https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/sep/20/us-book-bans-fight-school-librar
"How To Fight Book Bans and Challenges: An Anti-Censorship Tool Kit" by Kelly Jensen (Book Riot) https://bookriot.com/how-to-fight-book-bans-and-challenges/
"Unite Against Book Bans Campaign" by the American Library Association https://uniteagainstbookbans.org/
Inquiry Questions to Consider Asking Students:
Finally, here are a set of inquiry questions that teachers might ask students about book bans (and burnings) in the past and present. To
help students answer these questions, teachers can use the above linked
sources from the post:
- How should we remember the history of book bans and burnings?
- Using examples from history, what are some effective ways that students and parents organized to stop book bans?
- Are current book bans in states like Florida or Texas constitutional? Do they cause harm to students?
