To Kill a Mockingbird Banned in School

By Dianna Dilworth 

A school in Virginia has removed To Kill a Mockingbird and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from the curriculum, after a parent complained about racial slurs used in the text.

The copies of the Harper Lee and Mark Twain’s classics were pulled from the school in Accomack County, after the parent of a biracial teen lodged a formal complaint about the use of the N-word in these books. The district has formed a committee to review the titles and decide if they should continue to be taught. The Washington Post has the scoop:

The parent, Marie Rothstein-Williams, made an emotional plea at a school board meeting Nov. 15, saying the works had disturbed her teenage son, a biracial student at Nandua High School on Virginia’s Eastern Shore.

“I’m not disputing this is great literature,” Rothstein-Williams said. “But there is so much racial slurs in there and offensive wording that you can’t get past that, and right now we are a nation divided as it is.”