Celebrating Freedom to Read Week
Published on February 13, 2024
The 'Freedom to Read' (that is, the public's right to access information and materials from a diversity of cultural, economic, educational, political, and social perspectives and positionalities, as well as libraries' rights to disseminate this information) is something we often take for granted in institutions of higher education. As many of us are now witnessing, however, coordinated efforts to censor books and curtail access to library materials are happening across our region, province, and country at this time, and are on the rise. Yes, even here in Canada.
Freedom to Read Week "raises awareness about censorship and access to books [and] has become a nationwide campaign uniting readers, writers, publishers, schools, libraries, bookstores, universities, colleges, and other organizations across Canada."
Along with our colleagues in school and public libraries, and those engaged in public awareness and advocacy efforts in provincial and national non-profit sector organizations, we invite you, the Western community, to mark this year's Freedom to Read Week (F2RW) by continuing to read freely, and while doing so, helping to raise awareness about just how important the 'Freedom to Read' is for all members of our community. Western's librarians, archivists, and library staff encourage you to read a banned book, to talk about the F2RW with your friends, family, and colleagues, and to actively support the right to read in your community.
We invite you to browse and sign out materials from our 'Freedom to Read' collection, and better yet, recommend a purchase to broaden our holdings even further!
#FTRWeek #FreedomToRead #Freadom #FreePeopleReadFreely
Melanie Mills, Director, FIMS Graduate Library
Faculty of Information & Media Studies
Western University
