Book banning in Canadian school districts

community · 2024 · Canada

Several Canadian school districts, including Peel, Surrey, Toronto Catholic, and Upper Canada District School Boards, have removed or banned classic books from school libraries or reading lists due to offensive language or outdated content. This includes classics such as To Kill a Mockingbird, Of Mice and Men, and Harry Potter series.

This is the archive, not the newspaper. Between 2018 and 2026 this site compiled these items automatically from public community sources — chiefly The Islands Grapevine, regional news feeds and community groups. They were not written by a reporter and were not held to the standards this publication now applies. The archive is kept because it is a useful dated record of what happened on Denman, and it is labelled because pretending otherwise would be the first thing we would tell you not to trust. Current reporting is at The Denman Firestarter.

Sources

  • “Peel District School Board decision to remove books published before 2008 from school libraries... Surrey school district has removed Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird and John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men... Toronto Catholic school board recently passed a policy banning the assigning of books containing racial slurs... Upper Canada District School Board banned Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None.” — The Islands Grapevine – May 23rd, 2024 (May 23rd, 2024)

Spotted an error? corrections@denmanisland.co.

Related private projects: abolishislandstrust.org · denmantown.org