Banned in the USA: Banned, Challenged, and Controversial YA Fiction in America (Dr Jennifer Gouck)

Dr Jennifer Gouck, Women in Research Fellow, Universität Münster

Banned in the USA: Banned, Challenged, and Controversial YA Fiction in America

The First Amendment to the United States Bill of Rights allows individuals to speak, publish, read, and watch what they want, effectively forbidding governmental censorship of books, magazines, and newspapers as well as art, film, music, and online materials. Yet, since the 1980s, the American Library Association (ALA) has run Banned Books Week, an annual event which spotlights current and historical attempts to censor books in libraries and schools. The Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom also compiles lists of challenged or banned books that are released annually. Notably, the majority of the titles on these lists are Children’s and Young Adult (YA) literature.

This lecture will offer an overview of the current state of censorship in the America, asking why and how these books are banned and by whom. By examining some of the YA texts featured on the ALA’s ‘Top 10 Most Challenged Books’ lists, the talk will also discuss the complicated relationship between prizewinning and banned books. Finally, as scandals and controversies surrounding once-beloved authors like Sherman Alexie, J.K. Rowling, and Neil Gaiman continue to emerge in the literary world, this session considers some of the key debates surrounding who and what we teach in our classrooms – and why.

Veranstaltet von der Professur für Kinder- und Jugendliteraturforschung des Instituts für Germanistik (Prof. Dr. Tobias Kurwinkel)

Vortrag im Rahmen der Vorlesung "Grundlagen der Kinder- und Jugendliteratur" (Koordination: Dr. Philipp Schmerheim)