Research Roundup: Talking about Banned Books

Sue Kimmel and Danielle Hartsfield recently won an AASL Research Award for their research paper on the discourse surrounding challenged books among pre-service educators and librarians.

Research Article Recap

Student A: "The Office for Intellectual Freedom for the past couple of years has been concerned with the content of The Hunger Games."

Student B: "I can see why this book might have been banned by an organization."

Students in our graduate children's literature course had been assigned to read a book from one of the ALA lists of frequently challenged titles http://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks and to talk about it on the course discussion board. The above interchange between two students occurred in this discussion. As researchers, we were reviewing the discussion board posts to examine how pre-service school librarians and teachers talked about challenged books selected from lists of Banned and Challenged Books published by the American Library Association's Office of Intellectual Freedom (ALA/OIF) and were alarmed to realize that at least two students seemed to believe the OIF were the ones identifying and banning the books. ALA does publish lists each year of various notable books, was it possible these students also thought they published lists of books to avoid? As we began to explore the ALA/OIF website we found "Does ALA ban books?" on the Frequently Asked Questions page. Apparently, we had encountered a common misperception. We wanted to understand what was going on and undertook an analysis to explore the research question, "What meanings of ALA's lists of frequently challenged books are present in discussions of books from ALA's Frequently Challenged lists among pre-service educators and school librarians?"

We chose a discourse analysis because it allowed us to look very closely at the ways students were discussing the lists of challenged books to uncover possible taken for granted meanings about ALA and how the lists were constructed. A discourse analysis looks at language in use as inherently political and concerned with relationships of power. Given that censorship is about power, we were interested both in the way ALA creates a discourse surrounding challenged and banned books and about how individuals construct their own meanings from that discourse. We isolated every reference to the ALA/OIF lists in the discussions from two sections of our online course to look for patterns within and across these utterances. We used a tool recommended for discourse analysis from James Paul Gee called the figured worlds tool asking for each utterance, "what must the speaker assume about the world of banned or challenged books to have responded this way."

We found and analyzed 35 references to the ALA/OIF lists and determined these clustered around two major themes. The first was that an appearance on the list was an accomplishment much like topping the music or bestselling books charts. As one student said about the picture book And Tango Makes Three: "This book was published in 2005, and has remained at the top of the most frequently challenged books for five years, with a brief stay at number two slot in 2009." The second was the implication that books were placed on the list for qualitative reasons such as profanity or sexual content. A student's statement that "There are a number of reasons this book is considered #8 on the American Library Association's list of frequently banned classics" suggests that the book was placed on the list for "a number of reasons" rather than the fact that the book was the eighth most frequently challenged book reported to ALA/OIF in a given time frame. One can see how this misunderstanding might lead to the interchange we quoted above because it suggests someone is considering the content of the book when deciding where to place it on the ALA/OIF lists. We then explored the ALA/OIF website and found similar use of language there. For example, The Hate U Give was listed as #8 on the "Top Eleven for 2018" with this "Reasons: banned and challenged because it was deemed "anti-cop," and for profanity, drug use, and sexual references."

Interview with Rebecca Morris

Rebecca Morris: Dr. Kimmel and Dr. Hartsfield, congratulations on being named recipients of the 2019 AASL Research Grant! Thank you for spending some time talking about your work with us. As librarians and readers, we hear a lot about "banned books" and Banned Books Week. We might assume that everyone has a similar understanding of banned books and the recognition of banned books, but you talk about some complexities and controversies with the notion of "banned books." Can you introduce us to some of the issues that you describe?

Sue Kimmel and Danielle Hartsfield: The choice of term "banned" exaggerates one aspect of censorship: that of denying access to a book by removing it from a collection. As ALA/OIF points out, due to the efforts of librarians, OIF, and others concerned with combatting censorship, many challenges are unsuccessful and do not result in the banning of the book. School librarians and educators are often on the front lines facing these challenges and should be aware of the support provided by ALA/OIF. But the hyperbole, including exhortations to "celebrate" Banned Books Week, masks the more subtle decisions of librarians and educators to select (or not) and provide access (or not) to diverse and controversial materials for young people. A driving question for our research has surrounded how and why school librarians and teachers self-censor by choosing not to acquire or share books about difficult topics because they fear engaging in controversy about those books. The language surrounding "banned books" is divisive and distracting from the critical issues of providing access to ideas and information through the selection of high quality materials through the application of selection criteria that include relevance, authoritative treatment, various points of view, and excellence in the presentation.

RM: Your study came about during a graduate course on children's literature, in an online discussion about banned books. The students in the class were pre-service school librarians and teachers, and in some posts pertaining to ALA's role in banning books, a few responses seemed to show misunderstandings around censorship and intellectual freedom. What concerned you in the students' statements?

SK & DH: We were concerned that pre-service school librarians and teachers might use the lists to identify books they should avoid having in their classrooms or libraries. This could result in restricting access to these books. We also wanted to ensure that our students understand the strong position of the library profession regarding censorship and access.

RM: Language and meaning were a central focus in the methods you used in this research study. Can you give us an example of how you analyzed the use of language to understand how your students were interpreting banned or challenged books?

SK & DH: We each read through the instances where our students were talking about the ALA/OIF lists independently, asking "what must the speaker assume about the world of banned or challenged books to have responded this way?" We then got together to discuss our findings and the themes we were noticing. For example, a student stated "I agree that Captain Underpants should not be on the banned list." We looked at every word in this brief sentence. First naming the list as "the banned list" includes the determinate "the" as if there is only one list. The use of the word "banned" fails to capture the nuance that the book was likely challenged not banned. The verb choice "should" suggests the book's placement on the list is a matter of opinion rather than a quantitative measure of actual challenges to the book in a given year. While clearly a student might have been sloppy in their word choice, the fact is that we saw this type of language again and again and now understand how it perpetuates the meaning of the list in the exchange at the beginning of this article and the FAQ "Does ALA ban books?"

RM: What do these findings mean for you as instructors of children's literature?

SK & DH: We have decided the assignment to read a book from one of the Frequently Challenged ALA/OIF lists was problematic. We were also guilty of referencing it as the "Banned Book Assignment." We continue to talk about censorship and to introduce our students to the positions of ALA, National Council of Teachers of English, and International Literacy Association regarding censorship and access to ideas and information. We also introduced a reading autobiography assignment that asks our students to think about the books and people who were influential in their development as readers. It's not unusual for a student to remark, "I read Stephen King in fourth grade and I turned out all right." Beyond this we want future school librarians and teachers to recognize the powerful role they have as gatekeepers in selecting and providing access to information and ideas about difficult topics for diverse learners.

RM: What do you hope school librarians currently practicing in the field will take away from your study?

SK & DH: We would like library professionals to engage in deeper reflection and conversations about how we select materials for our collections. Self-censorship is a real issue today. When we make decisions based on fear of controversy, we are complicit with the censors. When we choose not to include a book in a library collection, we have pre-emptively done the work of the censor by denying access to the title. Instead, we would ask librarians to become familiar with the selection policies in their school divisions and the procedures in place to handle a book challenge. We would recommend engaging teachers and parents in conversations about how materials are selected for classrooms and libraries.

We would argue that Banned Books Week might more accurately be called "Banned and Challenged Books Week." In an era of increasing political polarization, we would invite a discussion and celebration of the varying and diverse perspectives that are fundamental criteria in our book selection.

SLC congratulates Drs. Kimmel and Hartsfield for their award, and extends appreciation for introducing new perspectives on a critical issue. Our readers can review suggestions and topics for further learning in the infographic "Censorship: Don't Celebrate, Educate," and seek out and read the full article, cited below.

Kimmel, Sue C. and Danielle E. Hartsfield, "Does ALA Ban Books? Examining the Discourse of Challenged Books." The Library Quarterly 89, no. 3 (July 2019): 217-231. https://doi.org/10.1086/703469

Resources from Professional Organizations

American Library Association

Library Bill of Rights: http://www.ala.org/advocacy/intfreedom/librarybill

ALA Office of Intellectual Freedom: http://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks

National Council of Teachers of English

The Students' Right to Read: http://www2.ncte.org/statement/righttoreadguideline/

International Literacy Association https://www.literacyworldwide.org/get-resources/childrens-rights-to-read

Further Reading

Dresang, E.T. "Controversial Books and Contemporary Children." Journal of Children's Literature 29, no. 1 (2003): 20-31.

Fanetti, S. "A Case for Cultivating Controversy: Teaching Challenged Books in K-12 Classrooms." The ALAN Review 40, no. 1 (2012): 6-17.

Hartsfield, D.E.,and S.C. Kimmel. "Exploring Educators' Figured Worlds of Controversial Literature and Adolescent Readers. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy 63, no. 4 (Jan-Feb 2020). doi: 10.1002/jaal.989.

Ivey, G., & Johnston, P. "Engaging Disturbing Books." Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy 62, no. 2 (2016): 143-150.

Jacobson, L. "Unnatural Selection." School Library Journal, 62, no. 10 (2016): 20-24.

Kimmel, S.C., and D.E. Hartsfield. "'It Was…the Word "Scrotum" on the First Page': Educators' Perspectives of Controversial Literature." Journal of Teacher Education 70, no. 4 (2019): 335-346.