The last week of September annually marks the date for an awareness campaign on free speech, Banned Books Week. Back in my small, high school classrooms, teachers would encourage reading these books. I’ve become very fond of a few including Fahrenheit 451 and Brave New World. The irony with these books: both are censored due to their criticisms of censorship. Also, these two texts were required reading in high school. I’m thankful that these great literary works are now embraced instead of exiled, but what is being banned within American high schools?
In my four years at Lincoln-way East, I fell in love with Shakespeare, let my imagination dance with Fitzgerald, and rebelled with Orwell. I found the paperbacks in my chaotic locker almost always penned by dead, white males. First of all, this curriculum avoids too many current issues that are most prevalent in students’ lives. Also, these one-perspective pieces bound together advocate ethnocentrism, calling for me to forget everything the U of I has worked so hard for me to learn in my Global Studies class. America’s high schools must embrace the basis of freedom of expression, diversity of ideas, in order to fully educate our diverse makeup.
The literature curriculum ties with that of the history department. American high school textbooks remember America, not an accurate one. In fact, when James Loewen and coauthors proposed the text Mississippi: Conflict and Change, the Mississippi Textbook Purchasing Board refused the book, stripping their First Amendment right to pursue Truth with a capital T. Mississippi: Conflict and Change is an accurate portrayal of historic Mississippi that brutally acknowledges race relations in the state. The Purchasing Board found racial matters too controversial. In Loewen v. Turnispeed, U.S. District Judge Orma R. Smith found that the grounds for rejection were not justifiable and the authors were denied their First Amendment rights (1).
High school libraries are censoring students too. In Olathe, Kansas, the school board decided to remove the story of a lesbian romance, Annie on my Mind. The book was present in the school library for over a decade, but when gay rights were coming to a forefront and when students needed to confront the issue most, the school board decided to remove the novel (2). In Cedarville, Arkansas, my favorite boy wizard, Harry Potter, was removed from the school district’s libraries (3). Both school districts were found to be acting unconstitutionally in court.
Censorship is diluting our education. After receiving a high school diploma, I don’t know what really happened in history, I’m just breaking my ignorance on the present, and I’m worried about the future. As we found during our earliest days of First Amendment enlightenment, high schools avoid controversy at all costs but with that they avoid educating.
Sources
1. http://www.ala.org/ala/oif/firstamendment/courtcases/courtcases.htm
2. www.librarylaw.com/Liebler.doc
3. http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/news.aspx?id=11382
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4 comments:
I remember good old Lincoln-Way and their one-sided ciriculums. I am getting a much more diverse perspective from the American history I am taking right now (at the U of I) than the American history class I recieved in high school; I now have a much better understanding of what really happened in America. The market place of ideas is filled with true and false ideas, but by allowing more diverse, truthful books in ciriculums, high school students will have a better chance at arriving at the Truth.
Hmm, very observant commentary on high school censorship. While it sounds like my high school taught considerably more minority literature, I am in agreement that we need to hear these minority voices in high schools to teach students America's true diversity, not just literature dominated by "dead white males." I also agree with your criticism of American history taught in high school. Even in an AP class that I took, AP US History, there were certain important controversies that were skipped over or only lightly touched upon. History texts almost never talk in detail about the negative sides of past presidents--the Red Scare under Wilson, Truman's loyalty programs, the illegal FBI surveillance under several presidents, etc. American students need to learn about the mistakes of our past as well, not just have pro-American dogma ingrained into our heads.
I am a little confused about your statement that the court in Loewen v. Turnispeed found the grounds for the books' rejection unjustifiable and that the "authors were denied their First Amendment rights." If the court found the Board's rejection unjustifiable, doesn't that mean that the authors' rights were upheld?
You succinctly point out the irony that just as students need to be educated most about controversial issues, schools have the tendency to avoid them, sadly enough.
Farenheit 451, what a great book, it would be a shame if it were banned from the high school curriculum. It seems that in most high schools, the students are so sheltered that some just can't wait to get out of there. With the banning of books, they must want to spread their wings and leave even sooner. I can't believe Harry Potter was banned! The story is a fantasy novel, I don't even know what the basis of the ban would be, maybe it interferes with religions that don't look keenly on sorcery? Who knows? The market place needs to be open especially now with new interests that need to be addressed in high school communities.
Our government has a secret (or not so secret) agenda of "dumbing down" the masses. Pity.
Nice blog. xo
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