About the Author

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Lee Rakes is currently a doctoral student in the educational psychology department at Virginia Tech, where he also received his MSEd in health promotion and a B.S. in psychology. His current research interests include mastery learning, the implications of flow in a classroom setting, and academic assessment. Since 2005 he has been involved in education of youth to some extent, working as a tutor for the Virginia Tech Literacy Corp, a substitute teacher for Martinsville City Public Schools, or as the park interpreter/outreach coordinator for Fairy Stone State Park. During this time he has received several merits and awards, including one for Outstanding Tutor while at the Literacy Corp and Focus for Excellence awards while at Fairy Stone. He is currently employed at Virginia Tech as a graduate teaching assistant and at Fairy Stone State Park as the community outreach coordinator.

Thursday, January 28, 2010

Textbook Censorship

Authored by Lee Rakes & Nicole Lien

When dealing with the issue of power and control over school curriculum, a salient and pervasive issue that concerns teachers, administrators, and students alike is the censoring of information in textbooks. The K-12 textbook industry is largely relegated to four corporations, being Pearson, Vivendi, Reed Elsevier, and McGraw-Hill, with revenues in 2001 of more than $4 billion (Ravitch, 2004). These four corporations have several publishing companies that fall under their title. For example, Pearson owns Scott Foresman-Addison Wesley, Scott Foresman, Silver Burdett, Ginn, Prentice Hall, Modern Curriculum Press, Globe Fearon, and NCS. Driving the sales necessary to produce that $4 billion figure are the nearly 15,000 school districts in the United States. Texas and California comprise nearly 20 percent of those 15,000 districts, and thusly a great deal of influence about what subject matter is permitted or omitted in the textbooks they choose. Their sheer size coupled with the fact that they develop lists of approved texts from which local school districts can select (as do twenty-three other states) generates competition among publishers to create texts that will make the state-approved list.

As a publisher in the public education market there is incentive to produce textbooks that the largest market share is likely to adopt, in this case Texas and California, and then give the option to other states of either taking or leaving those texts. This option of take it or leave it is implemented because creating new materials would be too expensive to incur a desirable profit. “Publishers hope to recoup the costs of a big program from the sudden gush of money in a big adoption state, then turn a profit on the subsequent trickle from the ‘open territories’” (Ansary, 2004). Those companies that failed to make the list in these elusive two states are stuck recouping their loss for the next several years, usually six. Publishers who fail to make the approved textbook list for Texas and California struggle financially, thus making it even more difficult for them to compete in the next cycle of adoptions. As a result, there are only four publishers that capture a large percentage of the market. Knowing this, activist groups and other disgruntled individuals target the texts being produced and adopted in these two states due to the measures these publishers are willing to go to ensure sales. The result is textbook content printed in a manner to prevent any controversy, to the point even of self-censorship by the publisher. This self-censorship leads to distortion and outright omission of information; altering perceptions of history, science, and literature presented within texts they produce (Delfattore, 1992).

Several litigious activities have contributed to the current state of affairs regarding these censorship activities, including Mozert v. Hawkins County Public Schools, McLean v. Arkansas Board of Education, Aguillard v. Edwards, Smith v. Board of School Commissioners of Mobile County, Farrell v. Hall, and Virgil v. Columbia County School Board. Each of these cases were fueled by local controversy and strongly supported and financed through powerful national organizations capable of providing the resources and clout necessary to generate animosity over textbook content (Delfattore, 1992). Each of these organizations is comprised of religious fundamentalists who are not content with the fact that ideas and information contrary to their own beliefs is being promulgated in public schools. Some of these organizations include Concerned Women for America, Eagle Forum, Moral Majority, American Family Association, Educational Research Analysts, and The National Legal Foundation.

In Mozert v. Hawkins County Public Schools (1984) Tennessee parents were concerned that the Holt-series of books used by elementary teachers that included “Cinderella,” “Goldilocks,” and the “Wizard of Oz,” violated their fundamental religious beliefs and instead promoted secular humanism. The court did not rule in favor of the plaintiffs in this particular case. However, it did result in a self-censorship from the publishers who were responsible for these “controversial” works through the removal of most of the content that had been deemed inappropriate. In McLean v. Arkansas Board of Education (1982) and Aguillard v. Edwards (1987) the pressing issue concerned evolution (considered secular humanism, and thusly a religion by fundamentalists) and the right to teach creationism (thereby balancing religious teachings). McLean’s verdict determined that the teaching of creationism violated the establishment clause, while Aguillard’s ruling made the teaching of creationism outright unconstitutional.

The Smith v. Board of School Commissioners of Mobile County (1987) case initially resulted in the removal of forty-four history, social studies, and home economics textbooks from public school classrooms due to their violating the Establishment Clause, having been deemed as promoting secular humanism. The verdict was eventually overturned by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, citing that Mobile, Alabama schools could use textbooks which purportedly promoted secular humanism so long as those texts were found to promote important secular values (tolerance, self-respect, etc). Farrell v. Hall (1987) and Virgil v. Columbia County School Board (1989) both involved school boards that had banned literary classics such as Lysistrata, Macbeth, and the Autobiography of Ben Franklin because they contained “vulgar” material. In both cases the court held that school boards could indeed prohibit material they believed too vulgar for students from entering classrooms.

To summarize, the textbook industry is one which is partially driven by the whims of individuals and activists who take issue with content that runs contrary to what they--individuals and activists--consider appropriate for America’s youth. Influence from both liberal and conservative camps work to exert control over textbook content. However, there is particular salience for religious fundamentalist groups such as Educational Research Analysts and Concerned Women for America, due to their involvement in some of the more prominent litigations that have resulted in textbook censorship. Their influence, along with that of various other groups, organizations, and individuals have culminated to ensure publishers redact content that may cause controversy or potentially offend anyone one sect of the population.

An example of such redaction may be considered when evaluating textbooks that laud the accomplishments of Helen Keller, who was born both blind and deaf and eventually overcame her disabilities with the help of her teacher Ann Sullivan. What generally is not printed in public education textbooks, however, is the fact that she was a radical socialist, joining the Socialists Party of Massachusetts in 1909 (Loewen, 1995). This example along with the aforementioned litigious activities highlight the self-censorship publishers employ to avoid any potential conflict that may arise from extremists on either side of the political continuum. This in turn produces texts that are as dull and bland as the fundamentalist to whom they cater, and consequently epitomize drudgery and disconnect by those charged with reading and teaching from them. In the end, if the intention is to discover the true depth of topics surrounding such disciplines as literature, science, and history, or simply not keel over from sheer boredom, considering alternatives to textbooks allocated for elementary and secondary education in the United States should be endeavored.

Notes:
Delfattore, J. (1992). What Johnny shouldn’t read. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Loewen, J. W. (1995). Lies My Teacher Told Me. New York: Touchstone.
Ravitch, D. (2004). The language police: How pressure groups restrict what students learn.
New York: Vintage Books.
School Data Direct Retrieved December 2, 2009 from:
http://is.gd/5aKDF

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