Kiss My Bookmark

Banned Books Week is still over a week away but I'm faced with a bit of a censorship problem of my own at school, so I've decided to bump up the celebration and make my own Banned Books Two Week (sponsored in part by the ALA and in other part by me).

Over the summer I taught a Composition 2 class at MCC, and the class was focused around the literary genre of oral history. We read the book Underground by Haruki Murakami, using oral history to tell the victims' story of the Tokyo subway gas attack in 1995; we read excerpts from Studs Terkel's My American Century to read chunks of oral history discussing World War II in 'The Good War,' and black and white race relationships in the U.S. from the 50s to the 90s in 'Race.' Then to top off the semester, we read Rant: An Oral Biography of Buster Casey, which is a fictional oral history by Chuck Palahniuk, author of Fight Club et al. Palahniuk has been called a nihilist--for good reason--and he has a number of passages in the book that discuss, graphically, feminine sanitation products, prophylactics, and sex itself. The majority of these passages had direct relation to the plot and the book's characters, and the one that didn't sparked an interesting discussion about Palahniuk's alienation of his audience and the uncomfortable--and possible erroneous--choices he made for the book. Needless to say, the papers analyzing this text were particularly interesting for both me as well as for my students.

Now, here comes the problem: one of my students in the class, a former Composition 1 student of mine from the previous Fall '07 semester, approached me with just over a week left in the semester and with the class having already read half of the Palahniuk book. She explained that she had moral and religious objections to the book, would take an 'F' for the final paper (analyzing the book), and hoped she didn't offend me with her objections. I explained to her that no offense was taken, and since I'd rather she not get an 'F' for the paper, I offered her an alternate assignment. She did the assignment, mentioned no other issues, then approached me 20 minutes into the final exam to ask me, "Well, what should I do, since I didn't finish the book?" Having not prepared myself for such a problem, I told her to do the best she could and make sure to answer the essay questions using the first two books of the semester as comparisons to Rant (because I knew she'd at least have finished those texts).

Well, her final grade was a 'C,' not only because of the less-than-mediocre job she did on the final exam, but for her middle-of-the-road writing and absolute zero class participation throughout the entirety of the eight week semester. Well, once she got her grade, the second week in August, she sent me an e-mail about her 'shock' and disappointment in the grade and how she felt I'd discriminated against her. She also mentioned that by simply attempting to take the final exam, she felt she'd betrayed her God. Okay. After I discussed this with my department chair (a gloriously level-headed woman named Joann) that a sit-down was better than e-mail, we tried for the next four weeks to get a meeting with my student and her Pastor, who she decided would be joining us in this meeting. I made it clear that Joann and I would be fine, nay, happy to discuss the processes to appeal her grade or to request an academic withdrawal (disregard the grade for my class and take the course again with another instructor). We would not, however, be discussing the curriculum. Well, my student didn't quite like this, wouldn't commit to a meeting time for three weeks, then let me know she and her Pastor, realizing that we were only concerned with her grade (A'hem. Yes. That's our job.) would "be forced to seek audience elsewhere." Anyone else think that doesn't come from the phrase-book of a 19-year-old college student?

So she tearfully called my dean, who is as gloriously level-headed as my department chair, and he will be meeting with the student and her mother on Friday. The mother will be there because the student is uncomfortable discussing these matters with a male. Really? Guess so. My dean said he's glad he didn't mention that he was Jewish, or she might not have agreed to a meeting under any circumstances. Apparently the family has called a lawyer (Trevor jokingly said it's going to be the same lawyer who threatened the gallery about a political exhibit they had last month. That same lawyer is currently being disbarred by the Florida State Attorney's office because of his frivolous lawsuits. Real reputable thing going on here. I might give the good ol' ACLU a call myself) and my student's grades have been suffering (according to her mother, she's failing all of her classes) because she had to read this book. Hmmmmm. Sounds like bullshit. Lots and lots of bullshit. Our student life administrator and VP of students will also be present at the meeting (they're both women, and terrific women at that), and they've instructed me not to worry because this kind of thing happens. They're ridiculously laid back about the whole thing, which is, of course, reassuring to me. They said that they'll listen to my student and her mother (they refused to meet with the Pastor) and then tell them that they'll get back to them with a 'resolution.' This resolution might involve a statement drafted by our marketing department about the school's curriculum policy, or a statement from the school's lawyer about academic freedom and our policy of making damn-sure that books aren't banned in a public institution of higher learning. Although I'm sure it will be more legalese than that.

It's a weird feeling to watch this unfolding in front of me, knowing that I was the cause. I've spent the last month and a half bouncing between doubting myself as an educator on one side and feeling great about exposing my students to unconventional ideas and seeing the excellent and legitimately critical reactions to those ideas (on the most part--about 99% legitimately critical, 1% religiously fanatical and insane) on the other side. I was flipping through my Guide to Banned and Contested Books this afternoon to get a title list together of books to get for the BBW raffle I'm doing for my students, and it was, quite quickly as I looked through the 1,300 titles or so, all so terribly real. And this kind of thing happens all of the time. In 2008. In the United States of America.

This afternoon, Constitution Day on MCC's campus, I picked myself up a pocket Constitution, and will keep it at my desk for reference while I await a call from the press, an attorney, or a looney-ballooney calling to berate me about being a God-less heathen. And, as I'm learning, it's all in a day's work. Anyone still think that home-schooling is a good idea? Not so much anymore. Or ever.