Wednesday, December 15, 2021
"Gender Queer", a comic book by Maia Kobabe, leads to protests from parents when in school
libraries, such as a protest at Dolly Madison Library Dec 11 in MacLean VA
The presence of this book in some northern Virginia
school libraries, restored in Fairfax County, led to protests by some parents
near a library in McLean on Saturday Dec. 11
The book is a comic, graphic non-fiction
autobiography “Gender Queer” by Maia Kobabe, by Oni
Lion Forge, OSBN 1-5493-0400-2m printed in China, 240 pages. The style is that
of a graphic novel.
A teen (born as a girl) grows up in northern
California as asexual and non-binary.
She ('e') proposes that the English language adopt new pronouns e, em, and eir as singular
non-binary. As a practical matter it sounds fine, but some people won't want to
admit that non-binary persons can exist.
There are many pages where 'e' questions the
biological changes as puberty approaches, ranging from leg hair (around p 40)
to breasts and the need to wear a chest strap for a high school musical, even
tat the risk of cracked ribs!
There is a writeup and video of the protest Dec 11
here.
The Washington Post discusses this book and nine
others that have been banned in some public school libraries, in the article ‘These
are books school systems don’t want you to read, and why ’ by Laura Meckler
and Perry Stein, April 28, 2022. The
books include ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ by Harper Lee, ‘New Kid’ by Jerry Craft, ‘The
Complete Maus’ by Art Spiegelman, ‘The 1619 Project: The New Origin Story’ by Nikole
Hannah-Jones and the New York Times Magazine, ‘And Tango Makes Three’ by Justin
Richardson and Peter Parnell, ‘Out of Darkness’ by Ashley Hope Perez, ‘Stamped:
Racism, Anti-racism and You’ by Jason Reynolds and Ibram
X. Kendi, ‘The Bluest Eye’ by Toni Morrison, and ‘It’s
Perfectly Normal’ by Robert H. Harris and Michael Emberley.
Posted by Bill Boushka at 4:16 PM No comments:
Labels: book previews, gender identity