Carleton celebrated Freedom to Read Week for the third time from Feb. 21 to 27. The week is an annual, nation-wide event that celebrates the freedom of speech and expression granted to all Canadians under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, according to the event’s website.
To kick off the week, Carleton planned numerous events at the library and UniCentre revolving around intellectual freedom.
The first attraction was a photo booth on Feb. 22 and Feb. 23 in the library where students were able to get their mugshots taken with banned books.
According to the event website, books continue to be banned in countries around the world and books continue to be challenged at Canadian libraries, which means complaints have been made about the material’s content.
There was also an interactive display on the main floor of the library full of books that have been banned or challenged. One of the novels on the list was To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, which has been historically challenged in Canada and the United States.
To end the week, the library hosted a series of readings from banned and challenged books followed by a panel discussion.
Members of the Carleton community read aloud from the books in the main reading room of the library on Feb. 24 and 25.
The panel on Feb. 26 consisted of Andrew Potter, an editor at the Ottawa Citizen; Monique Désormeaux, the deputy chief executive officer of the Ottawa Public Library; Kathy Clark, an Ottawa-area children’s author; and Hossein Raeesi, a visiting scholar who is part of the Scholars at Risk network.
The panel discussion was moderated by Susan Harada, the associate director of the School of Journalism and Communication, who motivated discussion about freedom of written expression, censorship, and banned and challenged books.
