Book Bans, the Criminalization of Library Science, and the Death of Writers and Readers

Book bans, a form of censorship, occur when government officials, private individuals, religious groups, or other organizations or entities attempt to remove books from libraries, school reading lists, or the shelves of bookstores because of objections to a book’s content, depictions, ideas, or themes. Those seeking to ban specific books often assert that doing so is necessary to “protect children” from, inter alia, explicit sexuality, graphic violence, or offensive language. Free speech proponents, on the other hand, counter that book bans pose a threat to tolerance, free expression, and democracy. This chapter begins with an overview of book bans in the United States, noting the increase in books that have been challenged, restricted, and removed from schools and libraries in the last few years. As an example, this chapter considers the McMinn County (TN) Board of Education’s January 2022 vote to remove Maus, Art Spiegelman’s Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel on the Holocaust, from the district’s curriculum. From here, this chapter considers the impact and meaning of book bans for young people—our present and future writers and readers. In so doing, the chapter seeks to demonstrate why book banning should be of criminological concern.