Library staff are invited to participate in a survey into book bans in Australia.
The research is being conducted by Dr Alice Boer-Endacott with the aim of gaining a clearer understanding about the prevalence of book banning efforts in an Australian literary ecosystem. Although Australia seems to be resisting the global trend of book banning reasonably well, it is difficult to know how widespread these efforts are. As such, this project seeks to fill this gap in understanding to determine what books are the subject of book banning efforts, the justifications offered behind such efforts, and how our institutions respond.
It aims to do so by surveying those who experience the efforts of bookbans firsthand: librarians, school librarians, and booksellers.
The link to the survey is here: https://q.surveys.unimelb.edu.au/jfe/form/SV_agHFa8R68QYZFb0
Note that Dr Boer-Endacott is also aware of ALIA’s Freedom to Read initiatives, and she does not intend to publish a comprehensive list of challenged titles as part of her research.
Posted on behalf of Alice Boer-Endacott, Lecturer, Applied Humanities, Executive Master of Arts, University of Melbourne