Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom To Read

All this week I’ll be celebrating banned books week by highlighting challenged or banned books. Why is banned books week important? According to the American Library Association (of which I’m a member),

By focusing on efforts across the country to remove or restrict access to books, Banned Books Week draws national attention to the harms of censorship.

As a parent, you have a right to decide what your own children should be exposed to, but I strongly believe that you do not have the right to dictate what other children have access to. So, let’s celebrate the books that have been challenged and see if you’ve read any of them and you can make the decision for yourself. Each day of Banned Books Week I’ll highlight several of the titles that were challenged or banned last year. Let’s see how they stack up.  Also? This is a blog hop so I’ll giveaway a $10 Amazon gift card to the winner!

Today’s the last day of Banned Books Week. In honor of that I thought we’d take a look at the authors of color and how they’ve played a role in BBW.  To be sure, authors of color include just about everyone who isn’t in the White majority, which brings a full complement of experiences to literature that readers might not otherwise be exposed.  Because many of these experiences contain violent situations and language, they are frequently part of the challenged and banned books list.

I’ve made a collage of the authors of color who often appear on the list.  Let’s see if you recognize any of them.

Hard to believe, isn’t it? Without these books we wouldn’t have any idea of the African American experience, the Hispanic experience or the Native American experience.  Can you imagine not knowing what you know about those groups and their struggles? And who didn’t cry when they read Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred Taylor?

What’s your fave author of color?

Thanks for tuning in to Banned Books Week!

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