I have never been prouder to be a part of this profession than I was on September 11 this year, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Barbara Jones, director of ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, at the entrance to ALA headquarters here in Chicago, making a simple statement of opposition to book burning. At our sides were Gerald … Continue reading Banning and Burning
I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that politically the library profession is quite liberal. There may be a lot more conservatives in the profession than I know about but if they exist, they are for the most part quiet and under cover. My experience is that the library profession is not just overwhelmingly … Continue reading The Conservatives Among Us
The Chicago Banned Books Week Read-Out on Saturday attracted some 150 people to historic Bughouse Square across from the magnificent Newberry Library. Lots of folks brought their kids, apparently unafraid that they might hear something "age inappropriate" read aloud. Frequently censored author Chris Crutcher emceed the program and began with a tale of his earliest … Continue reading Banned Books Read-Aloud Draws Crowd to Chicago’s Historic Bughouse Square
A new Delaware law that went into effect September 15 is enabling public libraries to get their internet use policies ready for the inevitable influx into their facilities of patrons wielding wireless devices. HB 340 extends libraries’ acceptable-use policies to any mobile devices that individuals bring onto library premises, and specifies that, while in the … Continue reading Acceptable-Use Policies Go Mobile in Delaware
I was tickled to death when I opened my September issue of AARP Bulletin and saw a full-page article about Banned Books Week. That was before the e-mails and calls flooded into the Office for Intellectual Freedom, demanding to know what business the American Library Association had banning books. Turns out the article, titled "Banned," … Continue reading Relax AARP Bulletin Readers, Librarians Do Not Celebrate Book Banning
Barbara Jones, director of the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, opened a 9/11 commemoration this afternoon that started taking shape earlier this week as a protest and ended up as a statement to the world that librarians value reading, learning, and tolerance over book-burning, fear, and ignorance. I have never been prouder to … Continue reading Qur’an Read-Out Commemorates 9/11, Decries Book Burning
Book burning is the most insidious form of book banning, and just as the American Library Association is preparing to celebrate the freedom to read during Banned Books Week, along comes one Rev. Terry Jones of the 50-member Dove World Outreach Center in Gainesville, Florida. The good reverend's idea of world outreach is to commemorate … Continue reading Fighting Fire with Free Speech: ALA Will Protest Book Burning with 9/11 Qur’an Reading
Intellectual freedom is one of our bedrock values, and as the intellectual freedom issues and challenges libraries face are always evolving, so must the profession’s response. The eighth edition of the Intellectual Freedom Manual offers, among other updated material, three “new Interpretations” of the Library Bill of Rights; 10 revised Interpretations; resolutions on the retention … Continue reading New from ALA: September 2010
There’s been no dearth of opining in the past few days about the implications of Google and Verizon banding together to “find ways to protect the future openness of the internet and encourage the rapid deployment of broadband,” which is how a joint policy statement between the two firms is being framed by Alan Davidson, … Continue reading If You Google Net Neutrality, What Do You Get?
Librarians and their supporters spoke loudly and clearly about the value of libraries during the American Library Association’s 2010 Annual Conference in Washington, D.C., June 24–29. On Library Advocacy Day, June 29, some 2,000 librarians and library supporters registered for a rally at Upper Senate Park, according to Emily Sheketoff, executive director of ALA’s Washington … Continue reading Librarians Head for the Hill to Rally for Reading
The following story is a cautionary tale for all of those people who say that the internet has replaced the reference collection and that Google has replaced reference librarians. On a cheery morning in late April 1992, I had a flight of whimsy. I woke up to the sounds of birds chirping outside and thought, … Continue reading Surveying My Sex Appeal
Before heading to ALA’s Annual Conference in Washington, D.C., young-adult author Adam Rapp spent an evening with fellow playwrights Edward Albee, Terrence McNally, and David Henry Hwang discussing censorship. Forty publishers, writers, artists, and supporters of the First Amendment gathered June 23 in the Manhattan apartment of Jane Friedman, former CEO of HarperCollins and current … Continue reading Playwrights Define Censorship
