LIT 222 Banned Books
This course introduces students to aesthetic, professional, and political issues surrounding banned books in America. We will read and critically analyze a wide variety of banned materials, grapple with the reasons that books are banned, study legislation and policies governing censorship, and formulate our own ethical positions on banning books. Because book bans disproportionately silence diverse voices, the course explicitly emphasizes BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, women¿s, and veterans¿ approaches to intellectual freedom, literary expression, and human agency. The course concludes with an exploration of organizations and associations united in supporting our freedom to read.
Recommended: WRIT 131.
Special information
4 Undergraduate credits
Effective January 1, 2025 to present
Meets graduation requirements for
Learning outcomes
General
- Demonstrate awareness of the scope and variety of banned books in America.
- Analyze banned works of literature and censorship efforts as expressions of individual and human values within a historical and social context.
- Respond critically to banned works of literary art.
- Articulate their own ethical views when considering censorship, contexts, and book banning.
- Apply core concepts (e.g., politics, justice, liberty, suppression, protest) to specific issues of book banning in America.
- Analyze and reflect on the ethical dimensions of legal, social, and scientific issues involved in banning books.
- Demonstrate awareness of the diversity of political motivations and interests of others in censoring books.
- Analyze book bans as tools to suppress BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ perspectives.
- Identify ways to exercise the rights and responsibilities of citizenship around issues of censorship.
Minnesota Transfer Curriculum
Goal 6: The Humanities and Fine Arts
- Demonstrate awareness of the scope and variety of works in the arts and humanities.
- Understand those works as expressions of individual and human values within a historical and social context.
- Respond critically to works in the arts and humanities.
- Engage in the creative process or interpretive performance.
- Articulate an informed personal reaction to works in the arts and humanities.
Goal 9: Ethical and Civic Responsibility
- Examine, articulate, and apply their own ethical views.
- Understand and apply core concepts (e.g. politics, rights and obligations, justice, liberty) to specific issues.
- Analyze and reflect on the ethical dimensions of legal, social, and scientific issues.
- Recognize the diversity of political motivations and interests of others.
- Identify ways to exercise the rights and responsibilities of citizenship.