Treasurer of Sigma Tau Delta and English senior Aiden Wiscombe said the topic of banned books is becoming more and more important. 

"It’s integral to what we study, these books," Wiscombe said. "I think in a kind of politically charged climate like this, it’s important to spread awareness about it and find what we can do."

President of the society, English and environmental studies and sustainability senior Sydney Logsdon, said the term "banned books" doesn’t necessarily mean you won't find them on a shelf or online, but more so refers to books that have been challenged. 

"Usually that’s in the case of a parent or community member deciding that it’s too controversial or too mature for a child to read, though usually they’re not children's books," Logsdon said. "They’re just general books and they’re being taken out of public libraries and public schools."

The event started when the society was given a grant of $500 to buy books for the Gender and Sexuality Campus Center’s library. Logsdon said in conjunction with that effort, they wanted to put on an event their members could be excited for while also teaching the group how to lead events themselves when the current E-Board is gone. 

Wiscombe and Logsdon began the event with an educational slideshow about the practice before encouraging students to swap their titles with one another. During the presentation, Wiscombe said actions by lawmakers have resulted in public institutions having to wipe their shelves of certain books because of their content. 

"Diminished access is a form of censorship and has educational implications that extend beyond a title’s removal," he said, quoting PEN America’s definition of a school book ban.

Wiscombe said challenging a book is the attempt to eliminate the book from shelves while banning them is the act of doing so. However, the book swap was all-inclusive. 

After the presentation, students began to pass around their books. Some attendees provided piles of eligible titles while others grabbed extras brought in by Academic Advisor in MSU’s College of Arts & Letters Amy Lampe. 

Lampe said she had a pile of books that were left over door prizes from a recent play and when she heard about the event, she knew it was the right place for them to go. She said she could see the value in a swap like this. 

"They get banned because people are mad about them, they’re mad about what’s inside," Lampe said. "That’s clearly what you want to learn about, because you can learn about different perspectives than what you grew up with or what you’ve been told is important by authority figures."

She said she wishes it was a topic more discussed on campus and she believes communities should focus on why they want to ban a book rather than pushing for its removal. 

"Who’s to say what somebody else should learn?" Lampe said. 

During the discussion that followed the swap, questions were prompted on the projector screen behind the E-Board members. One of them asked if there are certain books that should be banned. The room responded with a resounding no. 

English and humanities pre-law sophomore Abby Brooks said book education is especially important and that no books should ever be banned, even if they contain negative content.  

"We can still learn from it, we can learn how to refute those negative or hateful perspectives," Brooks said. "We don’t have to teach it as much as we teach the other, more uplifting books."

Brooks said the community loses diverse perspectives when it allows the elimination of literature. 

"I’ve read a lot of the books on the banned book lists, the most prominent ones, and they’re not offensive," Brooks said. "They’re just challenging to the mind and even then, a lot of them aren't even that challenging, they’re just new perspectives people don’t want to embrace."

During the discussion, the topic turned to the ramifications on education of removing titles from circulation. Psychology junior Myles Reeves said when he was younger, he was surprised at how certain topics weren’t discussed in school. 

"I think it negatively affects education, and I say that because when I was living in Colorado, it was a predominantly white environment and I was surprised to learn that a lot of my classmates didn’t really know what Jim Crow was," Reeves said. "And so reading 'To Kill a Mockingbird' was beneficial for even understanding the history." 

Most students left the event with a new banned book to check off their list and then pass along. Brooks, who brought a large pile of her own banned books, said giving them away helps to preserve them.

"Educating people and nights like tonight, giving others the means to read these books, it means they are staying in circulation and they’re not just evaporating," Brooks said.