Showing posts with label banned books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label banned books. Show all posts

Thursday, July 3, 2025

2012 Video of Bill Moyers on the Freedom to Read and the "Bane of Banning Books"; Ethics, Info, Tech: Contested Voices, Values, Spaces, July 3, 2025

Kip Currier; 2012 Video of Bill Moyers on the Freedom to Read and the "Bane of Banning Books"

Nobody writes more illuminating "I-didn't-know-THAT-about-that-person" obituaries than the New York Times. (I didn't know, for example, that Moyers was an ordained Baptist minister.) And, true to form, the Times has an excellent obituary detailing the service-focused life of Bill Moyers, who passed away on June 26, 2025 at the age of 91. 

The moment I learned of his death, my mind went to a 3-minute video clip of Moyers that I've continued to use in a graduate ethics course lecture I give on Intellectual Freedom and Censorship. The clip is from 2012 but the vital importance of libraries and the freedom to read that Moyers extolls is as timely and essential as ever, given the explosion of book bans and censorship besetting the U.S. right now.

Below is a description of the video clip and this is the video link:

"The Bane of Banned Books

September 25, 2012

In honor of the 30th anniversary of the American Library Association’s “Banned Books Week,” Bill talks about the impact libraries have had on his youth, his dismay over book challenges in modern times, and why censorship is the biggest enemy of truth."

https://billmoyers.com/content/the-bane-of-banned-books/

Saturday, April 1, 2023

Zoom Panel: Haven’t We Been Here Before: A Panel Discussion on Banning LGBTQIA+ Books. Wednesday, April 5. 12:30 PM - 1:30 PM EDT. University of Pittsburgh

Haven’t We Been Here Before: A Panel Discussion on Banning LGBTQIA+ Books. Wednesday, April 5. 12:30 PM - 1:30 PM EDT. University of Pittsburgh

https://calendar.pitt.edu/event/been_here_before#.ZCgmRi-B2_U

[This session will be live via Zoom and also recorded for asynchronous viewing, following processing by Pitt. See registration link.]

There has been a recent uptick in attempts to remove or ban certain books from schools, public libraries and other educational spaces. In 2022 alone, 4 in 10 banned books contained LGBTQIA+ themes and representation, according to PEN America, a nonprofit organization that works to defend and celebrate free expression through the advancement of literature and human rights. 

Join the University Library System and the Pitt Queer Professionals for a lively virtual panel discussion with education, literary and legal experts on intellectual freedom and the societal impact of banning books. Guest panelists will be Dr. James “Kip” Currier, Assistant Professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Computing and Information (SCI) in the Information Culture and Data Stewardship (ICDS) Department, Dr. Katrina Bartow Jacobs, Associate Professor of Practice of Language, Literacy, and Culture within the Department of Teaching, Learning, and Leading and Jeff Trexler, Interim Director of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, an American non-profit organization formed to protect the First Amendment rights of comics creators, publishers, and retailers. The panel will be moderated by Acacia O’Connor (they/them/theirs) currently the University’s Executive Director of Social Media, and former manager of the Kids’ Right to Read Project of the National Coalition Against Censorship.  

Dial-In Information

Register at https://pitt.libcal.com/event/10570583Links to an external site.

Wednesday, April 5 at 12:30 p.m. to 1:30 p.m.

 Virtual Event

 Filter replies by unread