Late last month, Maus, a Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel about the Holocaust, was banned in Tennessee’s MCMINN county classrooms for its inappropriate language. But the controversy surrounding Maus is not unique. According to the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF), an average of 331 books per year have been banned or challenged in the past decade. In recent years, the number of banned and challenged books has also fluctuated with 156 and 330 banned or challenged books in 2020 and 2021 respectively.

Since 1990, OIF has been working to bring attention to literary censorship. As part of their initiative to spread awareness, the OIF creates a list of the most banned and challenged books each year. Additionally, each year the OIF organizes a Banned Books Week to celebrate the freedom of reading. This year, Banned Books Week will be from Sept. 18- Sept. 24.