What I did over Banned Books Week

October 1-7 was Banned Books Week. In addition to reading a book about an attempted book banning (Answers in the Pages) I was busy educating my community about recent book banning efforts, as well as historical book bans. On Tuesday I began teaching a six-week session at Bridgewater State University's Senior College called Off the Shelves: A History of Book Banning. On Wednesday I led a discussion on campus about banned books with students, faculty, and staff in attendance. The highlight of my week was on Wednesday evening when I participated in a panel discussion at Bridgewater Public Library. The recording is available here:

Bridgewater Book Banning Forum 

It was also covered in the local newspaper.

What's New About Fake News

Last fall I was on sabbatical. My intention during my time of reflection and scholarship was to research how to teach students to evaluate web resources. However, as the 2016 election season heated up I became concerned, as did many, with the proliferation of fake news and falsehoods being reported (both intentionally and unintentionally) in news sources and social media. And so my research was refocused. Ultimately what I concluded was that people need to read more, and read deeply if they are to become informed, critical thinkers, especially where the news in concerned.

I was excited to learn that the MassHumanities Fall Forum this year would bring together a panel of top-notch journalists to discuss the very topic I have been studying and presenting about during the past year. The panel included documentary filmmaker Charles Ferguson; Managing Editor of The Onion Marne Shure; and Claire Wardle, Strategy and Research Director of First Draft. Moderating this impressive group was Pulitzer Prizer winner Sacha Pfeiffer.

Ms. Wardle opened the discussion by admonishing all (panelists and audience members alike) to abolish the use of the term "fake news". She instead identified three different types of information that have been given this moniker:

Misinformation has no bad intent - perhaps something that is mistakenly reported by news media. Once the news source recognizes the mistake they rectify or clarify with the correct information.

Disinformation is deliberate, intentional spreading of news that is not true.

Malinformation is news that while true, or based in fact should not be disseminated. Examples are leaks, and hate speech.

Ms. Shure followed with commentary about satire, which is assuredly not the same as "fake news". Satire intends to train, not trick. Satire is used to help us see a larger truth through the use of humor. She specifically stated that when one of the stories from The Onion starts going viral as a "true" story it means that the writers have failed at their job. I especially liked what she said about Facebook's labeling of "satire" for stories such as those from The Onion. Labeling removes the burden of the "mental labor" required on the part of readers to identify satire themselves. This is not a good thing. Labeling essentially takes away the reader's agency.

I learned some new terms from the panel that helped me to think more deeply about how news is consumed and disseminated:

• Frankenbiting - splicing together of sound bites to make it appear that a person said something they didn't, even though all the words are theirs.
• Strategic Silence - a move on the part of the news media not to mention a fake news story, even with the intention of debunking it. Even when they report it as false, it helps the story to spread.
• Emotional Skepticism - Something that we should all employ before hitting the "share" button (or posting a comment). That which tells us to actually read a news story, and then wait a few minutes before sharing it, rather than simply reading the headline and allowing ourselves to become indignant.
• Arms race on technology - as new technologies are applied to programs in order to fight malicious information, we can be sure something else will be created in order to combat those. When we allow technology to make decisions for us how long is it before the technology is hijaked? Again, this conclusion mirrors one that I came to myself when I did some research for a presentation I gave at the Tafila Technical University in Jordon this summer. Technology is a tool, but it is not the end answer, (there is never just one answer)! Fresh concerns over consumers' agency arise. Most of us (myself included) do not understand the algorithms being used to tell us what to read. When we let other people, and machines, decide what we see we give up control. 

Once upon a time we all consumed the same news. Everyone in the neighborhood got the same paper, and watched the news from the same three networks on television. Now, each person can choose what they see, and what they don't see. This makes for a challenging way to run a democracy.

A special thanks to David Leonard, President of the Boston Public Library for the "shout out" to librarians at the end of the program!

More information about the forum and the panelists can be found here.  My husband's insights on the program can be found on his Environmental Geography blog.

October 4 - Precious Knowledge

Earlier this year, the Tucson Unified School District (TUSD) board voted to end its Mexican American Studies (MAS) program in order to comply with the Arizona law that bars ethnic studies programs designed to "overthrow the United States government"; promote "resentment toward a race of class of people"; are designed primarily for pupils of a particular ethnic group” or “advocate ethnic solidarity instead of the treatment of pupils as individuals.” The District was threatened with a loss of up to $15 million if found in violation of the law. As a consequence dozens of books were removed from the curriculum, and the classrooms (in at least one case while students were still there) and boxed up to be put into storage.

The film Precious Knowledge is a documentary film which relates the events leading up to the passage of HB 2281. The ignorance demonstrated by the legislators in this film is so huge as to be embarrassing. When invited to attend some of the Mexican American Studies classes, all but one refused, insisting that the teachers and students would stage a different kind of class than usual on the day they attended; and that even a surprise visit was meaningless because the instructors can "change their pedagogy just like that [finger snap]" when someone uninvited walks into the room. Based on these ridiculous assertions, the program was banned, despite the fact that students who took MAS classes were more likely to graduate.

Today, the U.S. Ethnic Studies Program of Bridgewater State University will host a viewing of the documentary. Some of the books that were removed from TUSD classrooms will be on display during the screening in the Rondileau Campus Center at One Park Ave at 12:30.

While TUSD Administrators claimed that no books were "banned"  when they were removed from classrooms this chilling photo tells another story. See the story from the Huffington Post


View the Precious Knowledge Trailer

Banned Websites Awareness Day - October 3, 2012

Last year students in Camden, Missouri found that they could not access affirming GLBT websites on school computers, even while websites that provided information on "reparative" therapies were visible. And students at Darmouth (Massachusetts) High School found themselves frustrated by the web software Fortigurad, which prevented them from accessing many legitimate news sources including NPR.Women looking for information on breast cancer have found themselves in the uncomfortable position of having to ask librarians to "unblock" the website so they could find out more about their condition. Even the conservative former congress member Dick Armey discovered that certain filters would prevent his constituents from finding his web presence.

Today, the American Association of School Librarians observes Banned Websites Awareness Day to bring attention to the problem of restrictive software that prevents educators, and others, from using the the resources they want, and other impacts it has on learning.

News about Banned Books for Banned Books Week

Libraries all over the country are setting up displays, blogging and otherwise drawing attention to the consequences of censorship during Banned Books Week. My favorite stories appear here

The coolest banned books display ever

My esteemed colleague, Ms. Mary O'Connell wrote this article for the Bridgewater (MA) Independent.

The Brentwood Public Library is currently reviewing the book Uncle Bobby's Wedding (a children's book about gay marriage) after a patron complaint that it was "inappropriate" for children

Even I was in for a few surprises when I read the Christian Science Monitor's list of Twenty Banned Books that May Surprise You


Smith Public Library in Wylie, Texas created this clever display using The Hunger Games series as a display theme.

Banned movies and their books

ACLU Texas Banned Books 2012 Report

Banned Books Week September 30-October 6 2012

 Celebrating 30 years of the freedom to read, Banned Books Week starts today. This auspicious event, started by the late Judith Krug in 1982, is observed annually to bring attention to the consequences of censorship and to ensure that no one person or group can dictate what others may read. I will be posting everyday this week about censorship, banned books, and libraries. For today, take a look at my banned books websites Pam's Banned Books Week Page and Banned Books at Maxwell Library. And find out about events going on all over the country this week at http://www.bannedbooksweek.org/events.

Choose Privacy Week Starts Today

There has been a lot of controversy here at Bridgewater State University during the past week over an article that was published in the student newspaper The Comment after a young woman spoke at a "Take Back the Night" rally and the newspaper printed more information about her than she wanted released. The editor of the paper has been asked by University administration to remove the article from the website, and large quantities of print copies of the paper disappeared from the stands (FYI - censorship will only bring more attention to whatever issue the censors wish to suppress). Some news reports indicated that the faculty adviser resigned, or that he had been fired, neither of which were true. There has been quite a bit of discussion on campus about what the roles of the paper, and also the young woman (who wanted to remain anonymous) were in this incident. I am afraid that as a society we have become desensitized to privacy issues. I am not sure that people understand that in many settings, both online, and in person, they are giving up some privacy. In passing the USA PATRIOT ACT the government told us that in order to protect us, we had to submit to Orwellian surveillance. In addition, personal information that once required court orders and subpoenas, in the digital age, is easily discovered through bread crumbs that we ourselves leave in the form of text messages, Facebook, and blogs!. The American Library Association is sponsoring Choose Privacy Week as a way to begin a conversation about privacy rights in the digital age. What information do you want people to know about you?

Watch this video to find out the wide variety of ways people think about privacy.

 

It's National Library Week

National Library Week is a national observance sponsored by the American Library Association (ALA) and libraries across the country each April. It is a time to celebrate the contributions of our nation’s libraries and librarians and to promote library use.

In honor of National Library Week you can:

• Visit your favorite library
• Enter the You Belong @ your library six word story sweepstakes
• Tell your library story
• Connect with your kids
• Take a librarian to lunch
• Read the 2012 State of Libraries Report
• Read a banned book

March 2 is Read Across America Day

In honor of Theodor Geisel's (a.k.a. Dr. Seuss's) birthday schools and libraries across the country celebrate Read Across America Day to encourage children to read. I am not sure if any Dr. Seuss books feature a librarian as a character, but a web search brought me to "We Love Sam" (go to p. 236 - it is very hard to read) an essay by children's librarian Starr LaTronica, which is included in the book Your Favorite Seuss, a collection of 13 Suess books, each with an introduction by someone whose life was changed by the story. LaTronica is, of course, referring to "Sam I am" from Green Eggs and Ham, a book so ubiquitous that when I read the Spanish version to my first-year students on the first day of the semester virtually all  identify it as a book they recognize.

Internet Archive Blackout Today

In a protest against two bills now pending in Congress (the Stop Online Piracy and the Protect IP Act) the technology industry is launching a 24-hour prostest today which will black-out many popular websites, including Wikipedia. This New York Times article provides more information.

How did I miss this? American Censorship Day.

My American Libraries Direct arrives in my e-mail box every Wednesday evening, so I usually do not read it until I come to work on Thursday. It turns out Wednesday was American Censorship Day. The day was chosen asone that that the Congress holds hearings on the  first American Internet Censorship System.

November is...

National Novel Writing Month

Take the challenge to write 50,000 words in 30 days!

Get support from others doing the same.
Also find out about 6 Great Novels Written in a Month or Less

Massachusetts Family Literacy Month

Read together! Enough said.

October is National Information Literacy Awareness Month

President Obama has proclaimed October National Information Literacy Awareness Month.

As an instruction librarian I teach information literacy, and I often have to begin by explaining what information literacy is. In a nutshell it is the ability to find, use, and evaluate a variety of information resources in order to do scholarly research, or to research for work realated or personal topics (e.g. health care, hobbies). For a more detailed explanation see the Association of College and Rearch Libraries standards page.

Banned Books Week Starts Today

Each year the American Library Association, in conjunction with the American Booksellers Association, the American Society of Journalists and Authors, and other organziations, sponsors Banned BooksWeek in order to celebrate our freedom to read and to bring awareness to the hundreds of attempts to censor or remove books from schools and libraries each year.

I have been doing displays and educational programs surrounding Banned Books Week for last ten years or so, and I am always reminded of an important lesson I learned back in library school: there is something to offend everyone; and everyone is offended by something. Religious works, children's picture books, biographies, novels, and textbooks have all been targets of censors. No library can maintain a collection without some materials that some population will find offensive. Indeed, we librarians would not be doing our jobs if we did not collect materials that explored a variety of viewpoints, however offensive some of those may seem even to us!

In honor of Banned Books Week I will post everyday through October 1 with commentary on banned books that features libraries or librarians. First up will be Harry Potter on September 25. In the meantime see my Banned Books Week websites
http://maxguides.bridgew.edu/bbw
http://webhost.bridgew.edu/phayesboh/banned_books_week11.htm

And watch the Read Out on the Banned Books Week YouTube Channel.

Nominate your favorite librarian for the "I Love My Librarian Award"

Each year the New York Times, the American Library Association, and the Carnegie Corporation sponsor the "I Love My Librarian Awards". Nominate your favorite, school, public or academic librarian for this prestigious award. Nominations for 2011 are accepted through September 12.