Upcoming Banned Books Week Events
Banned Books Week kicks off on Sunday! Raise awareness of the freedom to read with free promotional tools. Follow the conversation on Twitter #BannedBooksWeek.
During Banned Books Week (Sept. 26 – Oct. 2, 2021), libraries, their users and readers everywhere are invited to celebrate and exercise their freedom to read with resources and events from the American Library Association (ALA).
Banned Books Week is an annual event that spotlights current and historical attempts to censor books in libraries and schools and brings together the entire book community in shared support of the freedom to seek and to express ideas, even ideas that contain uncomfortable truths.
This upcoming Banned Books Week aims to draw attention to the power of stories to unify us and the divisiveness of censorship.
Join One World Lit and the American Library Association on Wednesday, September 29 at 8:00 PM ET on Zoom for a special Ideas & Action virtual event where we investigate-and celebrate-Banned Books Week, the freedom of ideas, and the necessity and power of even the most discomforting truths.
Featuring authors who have faced censorship directly, including Ta-Nehisi Coates (Between the World and Me), Nikole Hannah-Jones (The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story), Ibram X. Kendi (How to Be an Antiracist), and Bryan Stevenson (Just Mercy)-as well as authors who have joined the fight against censorship, including Cathy Park Hong (Minor Feelings), Heather McGhee (The Sum of Us), Adam Serwer (The Cruelty is the Point), and more-in a mix of live and recorded video appearances that reflect on the question, “What do you wish you had learned in school, but didn’t?”
Attendees will also hear from Janai Nelson, Associate Director-Counsel of the NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund, about legal challenges to important books and why certain books tend to stir up conversation about free speech and censorship-when we should really be discussing their groundbreaking ideas. Rashad Robinson, president of Color Of Change (and author of the forthcoming From Presence to Power) will share additional remarks.
Register
Retweet American Library Association
The Banned Books Week Coalition is delighted to host some amazing creators during Banned Books Week, September 26 – October 2, including a warm-up even with comics superstar Gene Luen Yang, Facebook Live events with the creators of the banned children’s books Something Happened in Our Town and One of a Kind Like Me and Banned Books Week Honorary Chair Jason Reynolds, and Twitter chats with Laurie Halse Anderson and Alex Gino!
Get the details here!
Retweet Banned Books Week
A Conversation With Gene Luen Yang: Censorship in Leander, Texas
Thursday, September 23, 7:00 – 8:00 p.m. EDT / 6:00 – 7:00 p.m. CDT / 4:00 – 5:00 p.m. CDT
Facebook Live: www.facebook.com/bannedbooksweek
Censorship of Children’s Books: A Conversation with the Creators of Something Happened in Our Town and One of a Kind, Like Me
Monday, September 27, 2:30 – 3:30 p.m. EDT / 1:30– 2:30 p.m. CDT / 11:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. PDT
Facebook Live: www.facebook.com/bannedbooksweek
Ask Jason Reynolds Anything* (*About Banned Books)
Tuesday, September 28, 1:00 – 2:00 p.m. EDT / 12:00– 1:00 p.m. CDT / 10:00 – 11:00 a.m. PDT
Facebook Live: www.facebook.com/bannedbooksweek
#BannedBooksChat on Twitter with Laurie Halse Anderson
Wednesday, September 29, 7:00 – 8:00 p.m. EDT / 6:00 – 7:00 p.m. CDT / 4:00 – 5:00 p.m. PDT
Twitter
#BannedBooksChat on Twitter with Alex Gino
Thursday, September 30, 7:00 – 8:00 p.m. EDT / 6:00 – 7:00 p.m. CDT / 4:00 – 5:00 p.m. PDT
Twitter
Kristin Pekoll is the Assistant Director at the Office for Intellectual Freedom. She is a former YA librarian from Wisconsin and a lifelong Green Bay Packers fan who happens to live in Chicago Bears country. She is the author of Beyond Banned Books: Defending Intellectual Freedom throughout Your Library published by ALA Editions in 2019.
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