Defending the Right to Read: Educators Report From the Front Lines of Cultural Struggle

• In Event: Reading Dangerously: Responding to Texts in These Times

Abstract

Diverse literature is under assault as schools and libraries are currently faced with an unprecedented number of challenges to books. The Office of Intellectual Freedom (OIF) of the American Library Association (ALA) documented 729 challenges during 2021; the most challenges recorded in a single year since the OIF started tracking challenges. Censorship is about the power to determine what others may and may not read. This study applies a collective case study design for the purpose of understanding the ways teachers and school librarians who have been involved in a book challenge describe their experiences. Bourdieu’s three forms of cultural capital: embodied, objectified, and institutionalized were applied to the analysis of the symbolic struggle represented by challenges to diverse literature.

Authors

• Danielle Sachdeva, University of North Georgia
  Presenting Author

• Sue C. Kimmel, Old Dominion University
  Presenting Author

• Jose Sebastian Cherres, University of North Georgia
  Presenting Author