Librotraficante: Contraband Books in Arizona
Posted by onehundredflowers on February 25, 2012
This comes from Colorlines.
Today’s Love Goes to Arizona’s Banned Book Smugglers
by Jorge Rivas
The Librotraficante Caravan is bringing contraband books—or “wet-books”—to Arizona. The project is also intended to raise awareness of the “prohibition” of the Mexican-American Studies Program and the removal of books from classrooms.
“When we heard that Tucson Unified School District administrators not only prohibited Mexican-American Studies, but then walked into classrooms, and in front of young Latino students, during class time, removed and boxed up books by our most beloved authors – that was too much. This offended us down to our soul. We had to respond,” said Tony Diaz, founder of Nuestra Palabra: Latino Writers Having Their Say, which has led the charge.
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Diaz added, “With their record of anti-immigrant legislation, politicians in Arizona have become experts in making humans illegal. We did not do enough to stop that, thus that anti-immigrant legislation spread to other states such as Alabama and Georgia. Now, these same legislators want to make thoughts illegal. If we allow this to happen, these laws, too, will spread. Other branches of ethnic studies will be prohibited, and other states will follow suit.”
The Librotraficante Caravan will travel from Houston, Texas, to Tucson, Ariz., carrying a payload of contraband books, creating networks of Underground Libraries and leaving community resources in its wake.
With just days away from launching the caravan Libroficante could use your help. A Kickstarter fundraising campaign didn’t work out they way hoped for, so donations are critical. For more information on how you can make a tax-deductible donation visit librotraficante.com/Donate.html.
pianomusicman said
!!!
chegitz guevara said
This is wonderful.
Retsnom said
How about teaching math, science and economics and worry about those studies in higher educational levels. Can you not see we are not teaching what is necessary to compete in a global economy. There is no anti-immigrant legislation but illegal immigrant legislation that has failed on the federal level. Lets be honest here and not inflame and confuse separate issues.
Sks said
Retsom:
NAFTA exists. Why is labor exempted from the same free trade as things?
My earliest ancestors to arrive in the USA did so before the USA existed. Yet I am a native Spanish speaker. English-only laws are not only “anti-illegal immigration” laws, they are anti-Citizen laws. That is why we become librotraficantes: racism is racism. Lets not hide it behind talk about law and order – that is disingenuous.