Meisha Lohmann, Binghamton University, State University of New York
A lecturer in English literature gets her students to examine children’s books through the lens of race, class and sexuality.
Librarian Sharice Towles checks in books at the main branch of the Reading Public Library circulation desk in Reading, Penn.
Ben Hasty/MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty Images
Librarians are defending the rights of readers and writers in the battle raging across the US over censorship, book challenges and book bans. That conflict has even changed how librarians are trained.
Book bans in Ron DeSantis’s Florida have censored beloved Australian author Mem Fox – for an illustrated character’s bath. But blanket nudity bans teach children bodies are ‘inherently sexual’.
There was a surge in book banning in 2021.
valmas/ iStock / Getty Images Plus
A free speech expert defines censorship and applies that lesson to current political struggles in the US to ban books from public schools and libraries.