The American Library Association is trying to politically-correct historical American frontier.
The Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal was changed to the Children’s Literature Legacy Award in a unanimous decision Saturday over racist language and themes present throughout Wilder’s series. The Board of the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) stated that her books have “expressions of stereotypical attitudes inconsistent with ALSC’s core values.”
Little House on the Prairie, based off of Wilder’s childhood, portrayed pioneer life on the American frontier. African Americans and Native Americans were portrayed negatively by the Ingalls family in the book series, later turned into a TV show in the 1970s. This wasn’t because Wilder hated them and intentionally used stereotypes, but because that was how she remembered her childhood life.
Cited by The Guardian, biographer Pamela Smith Hill stated that the “novels are full of phrases that are unacceptable today.” Of course they are, the books weren’t intended to be politically correct; they were intended to show what life was like in the late 1800s. That included racist remarks, which were commonplace back then. Hiding what truly happened in our history is dangerous. Children should know so they can learn from it.
Surprisingly, the ALA Office For Intellectual Freedom hosts a Banned Books Week every year that supports “freedom to seek and express ideas, even those some consider unorthodox or unpopular.” This decision doesn’t seem to “support freedom,” instead it restricts it. What’s next – removing books about the Civil War because they are “too racist?”
