Book banning has a huge negative effect on how students live, at school as well as at home. Book censors can only give unreasonable and unjustifiable motives for banning novels to validate their cause. In the end, the actions of the people who ban books create numerous negative effects on minors. Book banning limits student access to great works of literature. Many people regard William Shakespeare as one of the greatest English writers of all time, yet almost all of his plays have been prohibited from most schools.
The book should not be read to high school students, one reason being that it has too many racial slurs. People today get offended easily; especially the American people, they will try to sew anybody for anything, and this book will definitely trigger those emotions. The storyline takes place in the 19th century, so there were no limitations on racism like we have now. There was discrimination of the black community like slavery, lynching, unfair imprisonment, and many other ways. There are many appearances of the ‘N’ word and when we were reading in groups, it felt really uncomfortable when the word came up and I didn’t want to offend my classmates.
Censorship in America today has gotten way out of hand. When it comes to watching television, reading a book or magazine, listening to music, or buying products, citizens should be able to make these decisions for themselves. Where do we draw the line with censorship? After all we are Americans and we do have rights. Although censorship is needed with issues concerning children, majority of censorship is a violation of our rights because what one person may find offensive and obscene does not necessarily represent that all citizens.
The word “Nigger,” used for a member of any dark-skinned race of people and is often known for being offensive, is used over two hundred times in Huckleberry Finn. The word fuels and contributes to black people’s feelings of low self-esteem and to white people’s disrespect for them. In the classroom, while reading Huckleberry Finn, students do not want their differences highlighted to their fellow classmates. Huckleberry Finn accentuates their one difference that is always apparent, which is the color of their skin. People against the use of Huckleberry Finn in the schools believe black children are offended by the use of the word “nigger’ anywhere, no matter what the teacher uses to justify it.
Not only is there a strong chance that the book will bring back the use of the word Nigger, and other racist actions, but it also serves as a strong reminder to everyone, especially Americans, of a time in their country’s history that they would rather forget. However, isn’t education the key to stopping anything similar from ever happening? According to John Finch, the principal of Pasadena Middle School where some parents are pushing to ban the book, everyone is just over-reacting. “Children, young and old, are going to be exposed to racist ideas anyway, whether their parents like it or not.” “The school teaches core values that centre around equality, justice and diversity, and we have gone through a lengthy process in which we’ve talked to parents about the presence of the ‘N’ word. … We want to make sure children learn about justice and injustice, and one way to show that is to show negative and positive examples.” Ariel McSween, a 9th grade student of Pasadena School agrees with Mr Finch.
The African American culture has been a very important part of American History, yet it is constantly being overlooked from the American education programs. In Cole’s essay she pushes this issue and illustrates the bias on the black culture. She summarizes Black Studies in the term of five different challenges which include what is taught, to whom and by whom it is taught, how it is taught and why it is taught. These challenges explain the disregard of the Black Studies. It really intrigues me to see how the essay illustrates how much the African American culture is ignored in the education system.
In his novel, Tom is victimized at school in a way that is similar to “war”—the bully never lets up (Brown 2011). It was this famous novel that “evoked strong expressions of abhorrence towards, and condemnation of, the practice of bullying, and various suggestions were made on how it could be countered” (Rigby, Smith, Pepler 2004). While this novel helped spark public discussion and concern about bullying in schools, the types and prevalence of bullying in schools was somewhat unknown by the public. John Hughes’ novel served as the foundation for Olweus’ study in Scandinavia during the 1970’s, which explored the nature of bullying, the risks associated with bullying and the harm it causes (Rigby 2002). According to Nerissa S. Bauer, “bullying is aggressive behavior marked by an imbalance of power occurring repetitively with intent to harm and can either be physical (e.g., fighting, pushing) or relational (e.g., social exclusion, spreading rumors)” (Bauer 2007).
Khaled really brings out the real Afghanistan through his writing, a lot of things that he say are the blunt truth and that's why it created such controversies and leaded his book to one of the challenged books. Most parents agree that books such as the kite runner are not suitable for minors but some agree that the high school is the best age group to introduce challenged books too. Some parents welcomed the opportunity that current events, literature and movies provided to discuss the choices and challenges they knew their kids
Jacob Gartner Mrs. Bren World lit 11/9/10 Fun Times with Huckleberry Finn The book, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, has been threatened to be banned in high schools around the world. It is said that the book “Puts wrong ideas in the youngster’s heads and sets a bad example” (qtd Graff 353). This book should be taught to the kids in the upper grades of schools (around the age of 15-18), even though the book Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, has many bad words in it, it still teaches good things to the children, The book, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, is a great book and should not be banned in the schools, or libraries around the world, for the book teaches good morals. While Huck is in the woods, he has many adventures, and this is
The current high school history and social science curriculums do a very poor job teaching students about the Pre-European Americas, instead they are creating a bigger mistake than Allan R. Holmberg. While his mistake was published and everyone who read his 1950’s novel Nomads of the Longbow was mislead, high schools across the country are filling our younger generations’ heads with nonsense while building a foundation of misunderstandings of the original inhabitants of the Americas. As children, we are taught that Indians are savages, cannibals; they stereotypically performed sacrifices while running around in a loin cloth. As Holmberg so carefully puts it, “...the indigenous peoples of the Americas floated changelessly through the millennia until 1492” (Mann, 1491, 10). Implying that they were not intelligent enough to create their own history until the Spaniards came along.