NEW YORK — The country saw a growing effort to ban books in schools and libraries nationwide in 2022, and researchers expect to see more efforts to challenge books in 2023 as some Republican-backed laws across the country aim to restrict LGBTQ and racial content in school books.
While activists across the political spectrum have sought to restrict or protest some forms of literature, the vast majority of book challenges are from conservative-leaning groups, researchers say. Only a handful of efforts have also come from liberal sources, mainly targeting books with racist or offensive language.
According to the American Library Association, most book challenges fail to remove books from classroom or library shelves completely. However, any book that is challenged is considered to be a"banned book."Books targeted by conservative groups were overwhelmingly written by or about people of color and LGBTQ people, according to anti-censorship researchers. According to PEN American and the ALA, many of the challenges reference the sexual content or inherent messaging in the books.
Legislative efforts in states like Florida, Utah, Missouri, Texas and more have also aimed to restrict the lessons and content educators could teach that include certain perspectives on race, gender and sexual orientation in the classroom. "It's shifting from parents and citizens giving lists to school boards, to laws," Friedman said."And that's a really significant shift because there's a huge difference between a school board responding to parental ire and a school board responding to threat of punishment from the government."
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