At least 50 groups have recently played a role in the growing movement to remove books from schools, a new analysis by PEN America shows.
PEN America, an advocacy organization for literature and free expression, released Monday its latest analysis of school library book and classroom curriculum bans that occurred during the 2021-2022 school year.
Jonathan Friedman, director of PEN America’s free expression and education programs and author of the report, said that in the past decade “there has never been organizing on this scale or with this kind of momentum,” but it’s important to understand that these censorship efforts, More often than not, they are run by non-parents who only learned about the books online without reading them, but require employees to remove them from the shelves.
The organization identified 50 groups operating at the national, state or local level that support bans in K-12 schools, and said it appears the majority of those groups have formed in the last year. They range from local Facebook groups or online groups to more established conservative organizations.
“While we think of book bans as the work of individual concerned citizens, our report demonstrates that today’s wave of bans represents a concerted campaign to ban books by sophisticated, ideological and well-equipped advocacy organizations,” said Suzanne Nossel, director advisor. executive of PEN America.
One of those groups is Moms for Liberty, a conservative group that came together last year to fight for parental rights in Florida and has since spread across the country. PEN America has identified seven other national groups with multiple chapters, as well as 38 groups operating at the state, regional or community level that appear unrelated to the national groups or to each other, the report said.
“Some of the groups embrace Christian nationalist political views, while many have mission statements geared toward reforming public schools, in some cases to provide more religious education,” according to the report.
Friedman said some of the groups stemmed from “the anger that was fueled against schools during the pandemic,” as some people shared their frustrations about school closings, mask mandates or vaccines. Other groups “have been around for a long time and now they’ve moved on to lobbying schools in new ways or with new success,” he said.
Moms for Liberty members have taken to podiums at school board meetings and rallies to protest mask and vaccine mandates, material in books and curricula related to race and LGBTQ rights, and critical race theory (CRT), among other issues.
PEN America said the actions of these groups can be “directly linked” to at least 20 percent of the book bans enacted in the 2021-2022 school year. These actions included members making statements at school board meetings, submitting a list of books for formal review, or filing documents to challenge books with school districts.
While people in America have the right to organize and advocate under the First Amendment, PEN America says it is concerned about how these tactics are being used with the “ultimate goal of restricting or banning books” and how often schools fall back on requirements of the groups without objection.
“Parents and community members play an important role in shaping what students learn in school, but this goes far beyond organic expressions of concern or the normal back-and-forth between parents and teachers in a healthy school environment,” Nossel said. . “These groups have made it their mission to undermine educators, sabotage students’ freedom to read, and fuel divisive battles that distract from teaching and learning.”
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As part of its report, PEN America published an updated count of book bans. From July 2021 to June 2022, the group says, there were 2,532 book bans across 1,648 different titles.
About 41 percent of those were books that tell stories related to LGBTQ people or that have a queer protagonist or prominent supporting character, the report said. Another 40% of titles have main characters who are people of color, while 21% of titles directly address issues of race and racism, the report said.
The findings are similar to those released last week by the American Library Association, which said US book censorship efforts are on track to surpass last year’s numbers.
ALA’s Office of Intellectual Freedom has tracked 681 attempts to ban or restrict “libraries” in K-12 schools, universities and public libraries across the country between January 1st and August 31st.
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The team tracked 729 book challenges in 2021 based on direct ALA reports, news coverage, and public records. The ALA said it was the largest number of attempts to ban books since the organization began compiling its list of most-challenged books.
The organization has been collecting data on banned books since 1990, but has published a list of the most challenged books since at least 2001.
“The unprecedented number of challenges we are already seeing this year reflect concerted, national efforts to silence marginalized or historically underrepresented voices and deny all of us – especially young people – the opportunity to explore a world beyond the boundaries of personal experience. ,” said ALA President Lessa Kananiʻopua Pelayo-Lozada.
