Library Activities Celebrating Banned Books Week

Banned Books Week highlights the importance of free access to information and the dangers of censorship. The Library will showcase a selection of challenged books and infographics about censorship in the lobby all week and host a free community event, Books on the Chopping Block with Outlaw Production Collective, at the Longmont Museum on Sunday, Oct. 5 from 2:30–4 pm. A Q&A about censorship will follow.

• Oct. 1 | Make and Take Station: Banned Book Art
• Oct 5 | Books on the Chopping Block at the Longmont Museum
• On Display in the Lobby Oct 5-11: Frequently Challenged Books and Censorship Infographics

From the American Library Association

The American Library Association and Banned Books Week Coalition are pleased to announce the theme for Banned Books Week 2025: “Censorship Is So 1984. Read for Your Rights.” Banned Books Week will take place October 5 – 11, 2025.

With the escalation in attempts to ban books in libraries, schools, and bookstores around the country, George Orwell’s cautionary tale “1984” serves a prescient warning about the dangers of censorship. This year’s theme reminds us that the right to read belongs to all of us, that censorship has no place in contemporary society, and that we must defend our rights.

“The 2025 theme of Banned Books Week serves as a reminder that censorship efforts persist to this day,” says former ALA President Cindy Hohl. “We must always come together to stand up for the right to read.”

During National Library Week, ALA released the Top 10 Most Challenged Books of 2024 list and the State of America’s Libraries report. The majority of book censorship attempts now originate from organized movements. Pressure groups and government entities that include elected officials, board members, and administrators initiated 72% of demands to censor books in school and public libraries. The 120 titles most frequently targeted for censorship during 2024 are all identified on partisan book rating sites, which provide tools for activists to demand the censorship of library books.

Banned Books Week launched in 1982 in response to a sudden surge in the number of book challenges in libraries, schools, and bookstores.

ALA is a founding member of the Banned Books Week Coalition (bannedbooksweek.org), an international alliance of diverse organizations joined by a commitment to increase awareness of the annual celebration of the freedom to read. The Coalition appoints an honorary chair and youth honorary chair to lead Banned Books Week. Past honorary chairs include banned authors Jason Reynolds (All American Boys, 2021) and George M. Johnson (All Boys Aren’t Blue, 2022), literacy champion LeVar Burton (Reading Rainbow, 2023), and filmmaker Ava DuVernay (Origin, 2024). The 2025 honorary chairs will be announced in the coming weeks.