Banned Books Week 2022

Banned Books Week 2022

“This is a dangerous time for readers and the public servants who provide access to reading materials. Readers, particularly students, are losing access to critical information, and librarians and teachers are under attack for doing their jobs.”
– Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom

Banned Books Week is the national book community’s annual celebration of the freedom to read.
Each year, the last full week in September the ALA helps sponsor Banned Books Week. This year, the celebration falls  September 18th-24th. The purpose of the campaign is to raise awareness of issues of censorship by highlighting those works that have been the most targeted for removal or restriction in libraries and schools across the country.

This year, Fort Bragg Branch Library is participating in Banned Books Week with a display of Banned and Challenged Books, a “Photo Booth” for everyone to get their picture taken as a Banned Book Reader and a lively Adult Book Group discussion of the often challenged book, The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison (9/29)

We hope you’ll stop in to check out our display and get your photo taken. (All photos will be posted on social media unless you specifically ask us not to.)

Top 10 Most Challenged Books of 2021

The ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom tracked 729 challenges to library, school, and university materials and services in 2021. Of the 1597 books that were targeted, here are the most challenged, along with the reasons cited for censoring the books:

1. Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe
   Reasons: Banned, challenged, and restricted for LGBTQIA+ content, and because it was considered to have sexually explicit images
2. Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison
   Reasons: Banned and challenged for LGBTQIA+ content and because it was considered to be sexually explicit
3. All Boys Aren’t Blue by George M. Johnson
   Reasons: Banned and challenged for LGBTQIA+ content, profanity, and because it was considered to be sexually explicit
4. Out of Darkness by Ashley Hope Perez
   Reasons: Banned, challenged, and restricted for depictions of abuse and because it was considered to be sexually explicit
5. The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
   Reasons: Banned and challenged for profanity, violence, and because it was thought to promote an anti-police message and indoctrination of a social agenda
6. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
   Reasons: Banned and challenged for profanity, sexual references and use of a derogatory term
7. Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews
   Reasons: Banned and challenged because it was considered sexually explicit and degrading to women
8. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
   Reasons: Banned and challenged because it depicts child sexual abuse and was considered sexually explicit
9. This Book is Gay by Juno Dawson
   Reasons: Banned, challenged, relocated, and restricted for providing sexual education and LGBTQIA+ content.
10. Beyond Magenta by Susan Kuklin
    Reasons: Banned and challenged for LGBTQIA+ content and because it was considered to be sexually explicit.

(You can read a little bit about the history of the event on the American Library Association’s (ALA) Banned Books Week website.)