Image: from Banning Books: is it even legal?

Overview

The American Library Association: Book Ban Data.

Books

Amanda Jones: That Librarian: The Fight Against Book Banning in America.

Jason Stanley: Erasing History: How Fascists Rewrite the Past to Control the Future.

Organizing Against Book Bans

Report Censorship.

Unite Against Book Bans.

Podcasts

Borrowed and Banned.

First Person podcast: A Small-Town Librarian Spoke Against Censorship. Then the Dark Money Came for Her.

Articles

2024

Tim Dickinson: Indiana Attorney General Sets Up Website for Snitching on ‘Socialist’ Teachers: Todd Rokita has launched a portal where citizens can tattle on so-called ‘woke’ educators.

Petula Dvorak: We now have to pass laws to protect freedoms we thought we had: The ‘Freedom to Read Act’ of Maryland is proposed to protect books and librarians.

Nuria Martinez-Keel: New criteria for Oklahoma textbooks asks for ‘traditional’ gender roles, reverence for religion.

Justine McDaniel & Hannah Natanson: Florida law led school district to pull 1,600 books — including dictionaries.

Hannah Natanson: Teachers are limiting lessons on political, social issues, report finds.

Hannah Natanson & Anumita Kaur: Red states threaten librarians with prison — as blue states work to protect them.

NPR: The number of book titles that people tried to ban rose by 65% last year.

Brett Sholtis: Parents confront Warwick school board over secret meeting with lawyer who has helped schools ban books.

Tovia Smith: In Georgia, a bill to cut all ties with the American Library Association is advancing.

Douglas Soule: ‘Challenges our authority’: School board in Florida bans book about book bans.

Neda Ulaby: A secret shelf of banned books thrives in a Texas school, under the nose of censors.

2023

Hannah Allam: Culture war in the stacks: Librarians marshal against rising book bans. Facing smear campaigns and death threats, librarians are on the front lines of what they call an urgent battle for intellectual freedom.

AP Press: Ta-Nehisi Coates attends school board meeting to back teacher told to stop using his book on racism.

Margery A. Beck: Publishing industry heavy-hitters sue Iowa over state’s new school book-banning law.

Steve Benen: GOP rep suggests replacing libraries with ‘church-owned’ alternatives.

Maya Henson Carey: Students Mobilize To Fight Censorship.

Reshma Kirpalani & Hannah Natanson: The lives upended by Florida’s school book wars.

Sarah Kuta: Why This School District Used A.I. to Help Determine Which Books to Ban: Iowa schools are struggling to comply with new laws banning books that aren’t “age appropriate.”

Steven Monacelli: The Texas Historical Commission Removed Books on Racism and Slavery From Plantation Gift Shops.

Hannah Natanson:

• Red states quit nation’s oldest library group amid culture war over books.
• Students want new books. Thanks to restrictions, librarians can’t buy them.  Schools are struggling to keep their shelves stocked as oversight by parents and school boards intensifies.
• The Post reviewed 1,000 school book challenges. Here’s what we found.
• Objection to sexual, LGBTQ content propels spike in book challenges.
• Her students reported her for a lesson on race. Can she trust them again? Mary Wood’s school reprimanded her for teaching a book by Ta-Nehisi Coates. Now she hopes her bond with students can survive South Carolina’s politics.
• ‘Racist,’ ‘grooming’: Why parents are trying to ban so many picture books.
• She challenges one school book a week. She says she’ll never stop.
• Red-state education restrictions leave textbook publishers in a bind.
• Are book bans discrimination? Biden administration to test new legal theory.

Hannah Natanson & Dan Rosenzweig-Ziff: Book removals may have violated student civil rights, Education Dept. says.