Re: [LM_NET] nakedness in books/reconsideration policy

[Robin Shtulman <robsht1@GPSK12.ORG>]

For ten years, I was the librarian in a largely blue-collar, rural  
school.  Sendak's _In the Night Kitchen_ was one of the books that  
went home with preschoolers, kindergarteners, and first graders as  
part of our home-school parent-child literacy program. It never caused  
even a whisper of a problem.

As with anything, you need to get to know your community.  The way you  
develop your library's collection should reflect the needs of the  
patrons.  Better to skip the purchase than to teach the kids (by  
example) that it's okay to deface the book if something in it  
discomfits you.

My two cents, meant only kindly.

Robin
-- 
Robin Shtulman
Librarian
Greenfield Middle School
Greenfield, MA
robsht1@gpsk12.org
413-772-1360 ext. 221


Quoting "Hastings, Jeff" <HASTINGJ@HOWELLSCHOOLS.COM>:

> Friends,
>
> I have to say that I was appalled, as well, at the suggestion of   
> drawing shorts on an illustration to cover up genitalia. Certain   
> things "just ain't right," and that's one of them.
>
> From an author or illustrator's perspective, I'm pretty sure that   
> I'd rather have my work remain on a bookstore shelf over the option   
> of having it "corrected" by a wrongheaded interloper, regardless of   
> their imagined rationale. In short, I'd say that if you can't get   
> behind a book cover-to-cover, don't purchase it.
>
> Look: Kids will always giggle, tastes will always change and   
> community standards will forever vary, but the Venus de Milo will   
> never ask to borrow your bikini.
>
> You dig?
>
> Jeffrey Hastings
> School Librarian
> Highlander Way Middle School
> Howell, Michigan
>
> hastingj@howellschools.com
>

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