Musings on children's and YA literature, the academy, and the relationship between them, from an English professor and mother.

Monday, December 08, 2008

Are we really talking about this again?

Here's the latest in the book censorship wars: a teacher in New Rochelle, NY (very near to my former hometown) has removed a section of Girl, Interrupted from students' copies of the book because the material was "of a sexual nature that we deemed inappropriate for teachers to present to their students."

Huh?

Listen, I haven't read the book. But these are twelfth-graders. I hate to break it to anyone, but these kids already know about sex. And someone thought they should read this book--not selections from it, but the book. And now they can't. Personally, I find underage marriage and suicide pacts offensive, but that doesn't mean high schoolers shouldn't read Romeo & Juliet. And so on.

Link from Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect.

1 comment:

  1. I read this on your blog yesterday and I couldn't stop thinking about it. Shocking that they have done it and even more so that they consider it a "liberty"!

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