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Banned Books Week Spotlight: Gadsden Public Library

Posted By Jonathan M. Kelley, Monday, September 23, 2013

Each day during Banned Books Week we will profile one of the seven recipients of FTRF's Judith F. Krug Memorial Fund 2013 Banned Books Week grants. Day 2 features the Gadsden Public Library in Alabama.

Hundreds of books were returned to the Gadsden Public Library's shelves to mark the beginning of Banned Books Week in Gadsden, Ala.  Both the removal and return of the books were featured prominently in the local paper, and kicked off a series of great events this week—most centered around Ray Bradbury's classic (and frequently challenged) Fahrenheit 451.

Tonight there will be a symbolic destruction of banned books in the library parking lot, in lieu of an actual burning of a symbolic representation of books (the library was unable to secure a burn permit!), followed by a reception.  On Friday there will be a Read-Out and banned books art exhibit at the local museum of art.

The Fahrenheit 451-related events include a lecture tomorrow by Gadsden State University professor Chris Harrison, and another on Wednesday by past Bradbury Center fellow Dr. Robert Woods.  Thursday there will be a Fahrenheit 451 discussion at a local brewpub, as well as a discussion with inmates at the Etowah County Jail.

A full list of events is here (and check out their beautiful flyer). All in all, an ambitious and exciting commemoration of Banned Books Week for the first Krug Fund recipient in Alabama!

Follow @gadsdenlibrary on Twitter and check out their Facebook page for updates and photos from their many events!

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Tags:  Banned Books Week  BBW2014  Judith Krug Memorial Fund 

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Banned Books Week spotlight: Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library

Posted By Jonathan M. Kelley, Sunday, September 22, 2013

Each day during Banned Books Week we will profile one of the seven recipients of FTRF's Judith F. Krug Memorial Fund 2013 Banned Books Week grants. Day 1 features the Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library in Indianapolis.

Krug Fund awardee Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library has been a stalwart Banned Books Week supporter in recent years.  Last year, they made headlines when local author Corey Michael Dalton lived in the window of the storefront library/museum, surrounded by a wall of banned books, during which time he wrote a Vonnegut-inspired short story.

This year, another local author, Hugh Vandivier, is taking his turn in the window.  Each night, he'll listen to "bedtime stories"—excerpts from banned books.  Other events during the week include a talk by FTRF trustee (and ABFFE president) Chris Finan on attacks on YA literature, at the Indianapolis Public Library; a Banned Books Film Festival, featuring films such as Good Night and Good Luck and Howl; and a Banned Books Recovered art exhibition, for which several local authors have created their ideas of covers for such banned classics including Lolita, Tropic of Cancer, and Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret, and Slaughterhouse-Five.

Recently added to their line-up of events is Thursday's special day of Howard Zinn.  This sumemr, emails came to light revealing that then-Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels ordered a review of teacher instructional college courses with the intent of removing Zinn's work from curricula.

Finally, if you're not in Indianapolis, we invite you to participate in Monday's Google Hangout with Kurt Vonnegut's son, Mark.

A full schedule of events is available here.

Tags:  Banned Books Week  BBW2014  Judith Krug Memorial Fund 

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Seven organizations receive Krug Fund grants for Banned Books Week events

Posted By Jonathan M. Kelley, Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Seven organizations were awarded $1,000 grants from FTRF's Judith Krug Fund for 2013 Banned Books Week activities. Congratulations to the folks at Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library, Gadsden Public Library, Yuma County Library District, Judith's Reading Room, and the School of Law and Social Justice, along with Livingston Parish Library and Lockport Public Library, both in Louisiana!

We're thrilled to be able to support these great projects! For more information, check out our press release.

If you would like to support the Judith Krug Fund, please consider making a donation!

Tags:  2013  Banned Books Week  Judith Krug Memorial Fund  Read-Outs 

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Krug Fund grant deadline extended to Friday

Posted By Jonathan M. Kelley, Monday, April 29, 2013
The deadline for the FTRF Judith F. Krug Memorial Fund Banned Books Week event grants has been extended to this Friday, May 3 (Midnight Hawaii Time). If your library, school, university or community organization is interested in applying, please do so at www.ftrf.org/?Krug_BBW! Questions? Contact Jonathan Kelley at (312) 280-4226 or jokelley@ala.org.

Tags:  Banned Books Week  grants  In Our Mothers House  Judith Krug Memorial Fund  LeRoy C. Merritt Humanitarian Fund 

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Vonnegut, FTRF, and tonight's meet & greet

Posted By Jonathan M. Kelley, Thursday, April 11, 2013
Slaughterhouse-Five trading cardToday is the 6th anniversary of Kurt Vonnegut's death.

You may not be surprised to learn that FTRF and Vonnegut go way back: in fact, Slaughterhouse-Five was the book involved in FTRF's first court case. In 1971, the Freedom to Read Foundation provided a grant to the Rochester, Michigan school system to fight an attempt to remove the book from classrooms because it dealt in "religious matters" and thus using it in curricula was a violation of the First Amendment's Establishment Clause.
 
In May of that year, a state trial court agreed with the plaintiff, calling Slaughterhouse-Five "valueless" and suggesting that it could be obscene:
 
The court did read the book as requested for determination of factual matters and issues of law alike, and unfortunately did thus waste considerable time. At points, the court was deeply disgusted. How any educator entrusted during school hours with the educational, emotional and moral welfare and healthy growth of children could do other than reject such cheap, valueless reading material, is incomprehensible. Its repetitious obscenity and immorality, merely degrade and defile, teaching nothing. Contemporary literature, of real educational value to youth abounds, contains scientific, social and cultural facts, of which youth need more to know, today.

The judge subsequently ordered the book removed, basing his decision on the Establishment Clause rather than the question of obscenity (although citing several words that underscored his obscenity concern).

On June 12, 1972, the Michigan Court of Appeals overturned the lower court's decision. Clarifying the book was not obscene, the court found that just because a book discussed religion does not mean that it can't be used in a public school setting.  Such an idea was, in fact, "repugnant":
 
By couching a personal grievance in First Amendment language, one may not stifle freedom of expression. Vigorously opposed to such a suggestion, we stand firm in rendering plaintiff's theory constitutionally impermissible.

If plaintiff's contention was correct, then public school students could no longer marvel at Sir Galahad's saintly quest for the Holy Grail, nor be introduced to the dangers of Hitler's Mein Kampf nor read the mellifluous poetry of John Milton and John Donne. Unhappily, Robin Hood would be forced to forage without Friar Tuck and Shakespeare would have to delete Shylock from The Merchant of Venice. Is this to be the state of our law? Our Constitution does not command ignorance; on the contrary, it assures the people that the state may not relegate them to such a status and guarantees to all the precious and unfettered freedom of pursuing one's own intellectual pleasures in one's own personal way.

That was, of course, by no means the last challenge to Slaughterhouse-Five. In 1973, it was burned by school board members in Drake, ND. It was one of the books involved in the seminal 1982 Pico v. Island Trees Supreme Court case. 
 
Most recently, a highly publicized incident, the Republic, Missouri School Board in 2011 banned the book, along with Sarah Ockler's Twenty Boy Summer from schools. They voted to retain Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak (perhaps in part because of the viral #speakloudly campaign that the removal effort generated).  A few months later, the board modified the ban, allowing parents to check out the books in person.

In response to this, the Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library offered free copies of Slaughterhouse-Five to Republic high school students. At least 55 students took them up on the offer! 
 
Also that year, FTRF provided a Judith Krug Fund Banned Books Week grant to the Springfield-Greene County Library to help bring Ockler to Springfield (she also appeared that week at the KVML!) and to support a program with KVML board member and Vonnegut scholar Dr. William "Rodney" Allen appearing via Skype.  (Republic is located in Greene County.)  Last year, Slaughterhouse-Five was one of seven titles featured in the Lawrence, Kansas Public Library's "Banned Books Trading Cards" set, also made possible by the Krug Fund.
 
Applications for the 2013 round of Krug Fund grants are open through the end of this month.
 
Which brings us to today! This evening, in a coincidence of timing (though not of substance), the Freedom to Read Foundation will be holding a Meet & Greet at the Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library for attendees of the ACRL 2013 National Conference and other FTRF supporters in the Indianapolis area.  We hope to see a nice crowd there to explore the library, learn more about the Freedom to Read Foundation, and have a nosh.
 
And, of course, to celebrate the remarkable legacy of Kurt Vonnegut.

Tags:  Banned Books Week  Judith Krug Memorial Fund  Kurt Vonnegut  KVML  Pico  Republic  Slaughterhouse-Five 

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