Tag: social justice
Exploring Social Justice through Sci-Fi & Fantasy
I personally really enjoy (if “enjoy” can be considered the right word) the exploration of tough social justice issues through the lens of fantasy or science-fiction – often through the vehicle of anti-magic prejudice. I feel the fantasy context allows the reader to take a step back from the real world, while allowing the reader to think critically about equality and justice in a less personally challenging way.
Fighting Anti-Asian Racism: Tools for Libraries
When we provide library patrons with books that tell a fuller story about Asian American experience, we can help eliminate the conditions in which ignorance and fear flourish.
Fighting Censorship & Challenges to Powerful Teen Texts
Literature can provide youth and their teachers with meaningful tools for coping, discussing, and understanding. Library professionals have a duty to protect that access.
Happy Birthday, Maya Angelou
Dr. Angelou’s words urge us all to push past our fears, our anger, our hate. To find freedom in the good, the kind, the welcoming. To embrace our neighbor, both human and the world. To rise and feel the pulse of a new day.
Balancing Free Speech and Social Justice to Secure the Future of Intellectual Freedom
Katie Chamberlain Kritikos: The impetus for this talkback was the controversy surrounding the publication in January of this year of a children’s book called A Birthday Cake for George Washington. Because critics instantly condemned the book for its depiction of smiling slaves, publisher Scholastic Press withdrew the book and halted its distribution.
This withdrawal encapsulates the shifting social context of intellectual freedom in the United States. Traditionally, free speech advocates decry any attempt to suppress expression. A growing emphasis on social justice creates tension between the foundation and the future of intellectual freedom. This post considers the recent controversies over children’s books, trigger warnings, and free speech online to explore this crossroads of information policy.