Banned Books and Summer Reading

It’s a memory many of us have from childhood: going to the local library for a summer reading program that encouraged us to explore what was on the shelves. We graduated from storybooks to our first chapter books, read biographies geared for our grade level and learned about history. And with each book, we earned points that could be redeemed for a prize–from pencils to stickers to t-shirts. (At my local library, we received a coupon for a personal-sized pizza!)

Summer reading programs are the latest battleground in the inane war known as banned books. Banned books are part of a political agenda, not in the interest of protecting children. Limiting speech and art is not only dangerous to society, it hinders artists ability to freely express themselves.

Lessons from the past inform us that banning books is never on the right side of history, and is oftentimes associated with groups many would never want to be a part of. And yet, in the 2022-2023 school year alone, over 1,550 books were banned across 33 states. Florida, Texas, and Missouri are the states with the most amount of books banned, which includes many award winning books.?

Arguments in favor of banning books claim to be about protecting children, when in actuality, it is a means of control and form of propaganda to hinder exposure to other cultures and identities. @Ashley Hope Pérez, who wrote the young adult novel Out of Darkness, which is one of the most banned books, told NPR , “These book bans do not reflect spontaneous parental concern. Instead, they are part of an orchestrated effort to sow suspicion of public schools as scarily ‘woke’ and to signal opposition to certain identities and topics.”

The battle about what can be read by youths in the school library is also extending to what lessons teachers can teach. In states like Florida, there are laws around teaching about sexual orientation in elementary school. Laws like these do not protect children and can foster hostilities and hatred. Moreover, politicians are denying the first amendment rights of students to learn free from censorship and discrimination.

Banning books does not create a simpler reality for children; rather, it ignores reality. Books are an important tool for exploring and learning, and offer a safe avenue to do so. The library is a beacon of collective knowledge accumulated throughout history, and attempting to limit knowledge only hurts us.