Celebrate Your Right to Choose... Banned Books Week is Sept. 27 - Oct. 3

Stop by our Banned Books Week display at the front of our new welcome desk to see if some of your favorite books are in "jail" because they have been banned at some time in the U.S.  It is often the most memorable and lasting books that are banned by people who want to control your access to ideas.  Can you imagine not having the right to read a masterpiece such as To Kill A Mockingbird?

During the month of October, we have free access to the ebook edition of Burn This Book: PEN Writers Speak Out on the Power of the Word, edited by Toni Morrison.

"Published in conjunction with the PEN American Center, Burn This Book explores the meaning of censorship, and the power of literature to inform the way we see the world, and ourselves. Contributors including Toni Morrison, Salman Rushdie, Orhan Pamuk, David Grossman, Nadine Gordimer and other literary heavyweights, discuss the importance of writing from various views, both political and social. They illustrate the need for freedom of speech and human rights, and they emphasize the target writers become in a tyranny."  (from publisher's description) 

You can access this ebook beginning Oct. 1 through your NetLibrary account that you have created at school.   Use the link below to log in and then click on the "ebook of the month" box.  You can also create your NetLibrary account at this link, but you must create it on campus.

http://www.netlibrary.com/Login.aspx

Here's more interesting information on banned and challenged books:

This link takes you to a map of book bans and challenges in the U.S. from 2007-2009.  Click on the blue balloons to read about a book banned or challenged in each location:

http://bannedbooksweek.org/Mapofbookcensorship.html

Here's a list of frequently banned or challenged classics:

 http://www.ala.org/ala/issuesadvocacy/banned/frequentlychallenged/challengedclassics/reasonsbanned/index.cfm

The 100 most frequently challenged books from 1990-2000 are listed here:

http://www.ala.org/ala/issuesadvocacy/banned/frequentlychallenged/challengedbydecade/1990_2000.cfm