Purposeful Prose Advice Column: Banned Books?

Dear Purposeful Prose,

I’m confused about book banning. Some people say that it’s a good thing that books are banned because it keeps explicit content away from children. Other people say it’s harmful because information should always be easy to access. Isn’t all information easy to access? Even if a book is “banned”, it still gets sold in book stores, so what’s the point in saying it’s banned in the first place?

Book banning is a little bit more complicated than some people might think. When a book is banned, it isn’t erased from existence entirely. When a book is banned, it gets removed from specific libraries, bookstores, and schools. 

A book ban starts with a book being formally challenged by an individual or an organization. If the challenge is successful, the book that is challenged is removed from the library, school, institution, etc. An unsuccessful challenge means that the book remains. 

A person can challenge a book without having read that book or understanding its context. Those challenges can be made based on nothing further than personal biases. It’s difficult to enforce a book ban. That said, the place where we see the most adverse effects to book banning is in the classroom and in libraries. 

Classrooms and libraries are sanctuaries that center themselves around free access to information and to communities devoted to literacy. If governments are able to remove a key publication from a local library or school, that access will be revoked for someone who might not otherwise have the resources to access such information otherwise. The American Library Association (ALA) releases an annual list of challenged books. Looking at this list of most challenged books from 2024, what do you notice?

Many of these books depict LGBTQIA+ characters or themes. Many of these books cover racism, injustice towards marginalized communities, equity. A healthy discussion of any of these books, especially those that cover more difficult themes, can nurture empathy for those who have dealt with difficult life circumstances or those who just want to see themselves and their history depicted. 

From Morgan Gillbard of the Teachers College at Columbia University: “Material stripped from libraries and curriculum include works written by Black authors that discuss police brutality, the history of slavery in the U.S. and other issues. As such, Black students are among those who may be most affected by bans across the country, but — in Douglass’ view — this is simply one of the more recent disappointments in a long history of Black communities being let down by public education — chronicled in her 2020 book, and further supported by a 2021 study from Douglass’ Black Education Research Center that revealed how Black families lost trust in schools following the pandemic response and murder of George Floyd.” (All hyperlinks have been retained to include appropriate context.)

The public education system, while an essential institution, often fails the most vulnerable in their care. Yes, when it comes to book banning, this matters. When an otherwise age and grade level appropriate book is removed from a classroom [often by a force that does not understand the material that they are removing] that addresses essential difficulties that marginalized students face, those students are less safe. 

I highly encourage anyone, should they be able, to read Professor Sonya Douglass’ The Politics of Education Policy in an Era of Inequality on the evolving role of the educator and the education system in today’s landscape. I could never claim to do this book justice. 

More often than not, teachers and librarians whose job it is to curate book selection within their premises will have an effective grasp of what kind of material will be accessible to their students. 

(I am not saying that this is always the case, but it is often the case.)

A few years ago, I handed out books to young students with whom I was working on reading fluency. I was lucky enough to see one of them light up when one of the book’s illustrations showed a child who looked just like them. The book was on positive self-talk, and this child read all of the statements out loud in a confident voice. 

This book, not because of its content, but because of who it uplifts, is similar to many of today’s challenged children’s books, specifically these. My student more than deserved that moment, and may their voice never be silenced. May they grow up, read their history, see themselves in more of their literature, and be proud of who they are. 

If you would like to learn more about book banning, how books are challenged, and aftereffects, I recommend looking into Reads with Rachel. She reviews books and is a public schools parent who actively accompanies and encourages her children in their love of reading. 

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