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An Interactive Map of Banned and Challenged Books

By Minnesotastan in Book & Lit on Sep 28, 2009 at 5:30 pm


banned and challenged books

The last week in September is Banned Books Week.  To mark the event, an interactive map has been created that shows requests for removal of books from public libraries and school libraries for the period 2007-2009.  The map is created from cases reported to and documented by the American Library Association.

The image above is a screencap.  The interactive map itself can be accessed at this link.

The ALA also has a listing of the top ten most frequently challenged books for 2008.

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COMMENT
  1. symeon
    Sep 28th, 2009 at 6:12 pm

    "Banned book week" is such a self-indulgent sham perpetrated by the ALA for the sole purpose of pre-empting any challenge to a librarians' authority in selecting and de-selecting books.

  2. JP Carter
    Sep 28th, 2009 at 6:59 pm

    I live in Olathe, KS. We can be a bit backward here. Pronounced - O LAY THA. Suburb of Kansas City. People mock and attack what they do not understand. In addition, their parents most likely were just like them and questioned anything that did not fit into their limited worldview. Sad.

  3. Tempscire
    Sep 28th, 2009 at 7:37 pm

    Symeon, it's funny that you get huffy about the ALA supposedly trying to preempt librarians' authority about what books they shelve, but not the presumptuousness of these "moral guardians" who try to control what their community can obtain from the library.

    Librarians have a duty to make information and resources available without judgment or bias.
    ---

    Also, isn't it funny how many book challenges come from people who never actually read the book they're condemning? It's a well-established pattern.

  4. Kate D
    Sep 28th, 2009 at 8:09 pm

    Is the map just of the USA, or is it that Canadians are more sensible?

  5. Tempscire
    Sep 28th, 2009 at 10:52 pm

    Just the US.

  6. Neil
    Sep 28th, 2009 at 11:03 pm

    No, Kate, the Canadians are NOT more sensible. At least, they won't be in my view until the exhaustion of all of the establishment's appeals and challenges to Athanasios Hadjis' recent ruling declaring the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal's relentless assault on "hate" speech to be unconstitutional. Until then, the Canadian government will still be prosecuting people who publish truths the ruling tribe (same tribe as in every other western nation) fears, and thus has smeared with the Orwellian label of "hate."

  7. choggie
    Sep 28th, 2009 at 11:09 pm

    SOmeone should start slipping historically banned books into school libraries across the nation....Like some Wilhelm Reich for starters!!

  8. Alex the parrot
    Sep 28th, 2009 at 11:49 pm

    The Kite Runner is the best book I have read in a long, long time. I recommend it to everyone. A Thousand Splendid Suns was great too.

  9. VM
    Sep 29th, 2009 at 12:58 am

    JP Carter, I have to take your word as an inhabitant of Olathe that it can be "a bit backward" there but the rest of your statement is a little puzzling when put against the text of the word balloon shown. The complaint was about the book being "derogatory toward African-Americans, women and the developmentally disabled"...a criticism more likely to come from the lips of the PC Police than the kind of folks you portray in your paragraph. Sad.

  10. Video Game Dork
    Sep 29th, 2009 at 2:59 am

    its bothersome that 'homosexuality' is a catagory for bad things, on par with 'satanism', 'unsuitable for age group', and 'nudity'.

  11. Kate D
    Sep 29th, 2009 at 4:46 am

    @Neil: Breathe, dude.

    My implied question was really if and how many books are banned in Western countries outside the US? Is the US unique in its paranoia about reading materials?

  12. Melissa
    Sep 29th, 2009 at 10:32 am

    Hooray! My home state of Arkansas didn't have a marker anywhere on it. I'm shocked. There's a ton of really conservative religious type people here that I would have thought might have supported some book banning.

  13. dutchboy
    Sep 29th, 2009 at 11:07 am

    Historially ,Socialists are big into banning books.

  14. ted
    Sep 29th, 2009 at 5:48 pm

    Neil, WTF?

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