The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
One of the most banned books of all time going back over a 130 years, let's learn about a little boy's life after faking his own murder and meeting up with a slave.
Banned
1885 - Massachusetts - Banned in Concord as "trash and suitable only for the slums."
1905 - New York - Excluded from the Brooklyn Public Library's children's colleciton because "Huck not only itched but scratched, and that he said sweat when he should have said perspiration."
1930 - Confiscated at the USSR border
1957 - New York - Dropped from New York City list of books recommended for senior and junior high schools partly for use of racial language
1969 - Florida - Removed from Miami-Dade Junior College required reading because it "creates an emotional block for black students that inhibits learning."
1976 - Illinois - Challenged for racism at the New Trier High School at Winnetka
1981 - Pennsylvania - Challenged for racism at the Tamament Junior High in Warrington
1982
Iowa - Challenged for racism in Davenport Public Schools
Texas - Challenged for racism at the Sprint Independent School District in Houston
Virginia - Challenged for racism at the Mark Twain Intermediate School in Fairfax County
1983 - Pennsylvania - Challenged for racism in State College Area School District
1984 - Illinois - Challenged for racism in Springfield
1988
Illinois - Removed from required reading in teh Rockford public schools for racial language
Louisiana - REmoved from required reading and school libraries in Caddo Parish for racism
Michigan - Challenged at the Berrien Springs High School
1989 - Tennessee - Challenged at the Sevier Country High School in Sevierville for racial language and dialect
1990
Pennsylvania - Challenged at Erie High School for racism
Texas - Challenged in Plano Independent School District for racism
1991
Arizona - Challenged in the Mesa Unified School District because of racial language and damages self-esteem of black youth
Louisiana - Removed from required reading at Terrebonne Parish Schools in Houma for racial language
Michigan - Temporarily pulled from Portage classrooms after some black parents complained their children were uncomfortable
1992
California - Challenged at Modesto High as required language for racist language
North Carolina - Challenged at the Kinston Middle School as unsuitable for age group due to racist language
1993 - Pennsylvania - Challenged at Carlisle schools for racial language
1994
Georgia - Challenged at Taylor County High School in Butler for racial language, bad grammar, and does not reject slavery. Raised a grade level.
Texas - Challenged but retained on high school level by the Lewisville school board
1995
California - Removed from required reading lists in East San Jose high school after objections from black parents over racial language that erodes their children's self esteem and affects the children's performance
Connecticut - Removed from eighth grade curriculum at New Haven middle school complained it undermined the self-esteem of black youth.
Washington, D.C. - Removed from curriculum of the North Cathedral School for content and language
Wisconsin - Challenged in Kenosha Unified School after a complaint was filed with the local NAACP of offensive to black students
1996
Arizona - Challenged as required reading in an honors English class at the McClintock High School in Tempe by a teacher on behalf of their daughter and other black students. In May 1996, a class action lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Phoenix, alleging the district deprived minority students of educational opportunities by requiring racially offensive literature as part of class assignments. In January 1997, a federal judge dismissed the lawsuit stating he realized that "language in the novel was offensive and hurtful to the plaintiff," but that the suit failed to prove the district violated the student's civil rights or that the works were assigned with discriminatory intent. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco ruled that requiring public school students to read literary works that some find racially offensive is not discrimination prohibited by the equal protection clause or Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The ruling came in the case Monteiro v. Tempe Union High School District
Pennsylvania - removed from required reading list at the Upper Dublin schools because of its racial language
Texas - Banned from the Lindale Advanced Placement English reading list for "conflicting with the values of the community."
Washington - Challenged for being on the approved reading list in the Federal Way schools because it "promotes hate and racism"
1997
Indiana - Challenged at the Columbus North High School because the books is "degrading, insensitive, and oppressive"
New Jersey - Removed from Cherry Hill school classrooms after concerns were raised about racial language and depiction of African American characters. Reinstated later that year after the school board approved a new curriculum with a context of racial relations along with the works of Frederick Douglass, Maya Angelou, and Langston Hughes
Ohio - Challenged in South Euclid-Lyndhurst City Schools after a school complained that some classmates laughed at the racial language
Virginia - Challenged but retained at McLean High School in Fairfax despite a parent's complaint that the book offends African Americans
1998
Georgia - Challenged in the Dalton County schools for offensive language; Challenged in the Whitfield County for offensive language
Pennsylvania - The Pennsylvania NAACP called for the book's removal from required school reading lists across the state for racial language
1999 - Alaska - Recommended for removal because of racial language from the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District
2000 - Oklahoma - Challenged but retained at Enid schools after previously being removed in 1977
2001 - Illinois - Challenged in the Kankakee School District for racial language
2002 - Oregon - Challenged in the Portland schools by a black student who said he was offended by the racial language
2003 - Illinois - Challenged in teh Normal Community High School as being degrading
2004 - Washington - REmoved from reading lists in Renton high schools after a black student said the book degraded her and her culture. The novel was not required reading but was on approved book's list
2006 - Arizona - Challenged as required reading at Cactus High in Peoria. The student and mother threatened to file a civil-rights complaint of alleged racial treatment, segregation of the student, and the use of racial language in the classroom
2007
Michigan - Removed from Taylor school classes after complaints of racial language
Minnesota - Challenged but retained at Lakeville High School and the St. Louis Park High School in Minneapolis as required reading although staff was given training and alternate reading choices were made
Texas - Challenged at Richland High School in NOrth Richland Hills for racial language
2008 - Connecticut - Retained in Manchester School District with the requirement that teachers attend seminars about race before teaching the book
2016 - Virginia - The superintendent of Accomack County Public Schools confirmed the district had removed Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird” and Mark Twain’s “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” after a parent voiced her concerns during a Nov. 15 school board meeting, reported WAVY-TV.
2018 - Minnesota - Duluth Public Schools removed the book from the curriculum for use of the "n" word.
Sources
Doyle, Robert P. Banned Books: Challenging Our Freedom to Read. 2014.
Philips, Kristine. "A school district drops ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ and ‘Huckleberry Finn’ over use of the n-word." Washington Post. Retrieved on 2018 February 9 from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/education/wp/2018/02/07/a-school-district-drops-to-kill-a-mockingbird-and-huckleberry-finn-over-use-of-the-n-word/?utm_term=.f2df4a0b9d2d
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"Dances and Dames"
Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
