Libraries without a collection

the neoconcervative movement and the persecution of books

Abstract

Background: Current neoliberalism fosters the emergence of neoconservative movements, such as Escola Sem Partido (School Without a Party), which, through a wave of media and parliamentary action, seek to control the current educational debate. These movements impose a state of surveillance and denunciation, seeking to curb teaching practices, as well as persecute teaching materials and literature that do not fit into these groups' worldview. 

Purpose: This article aims to investigate the relationship between these neoconservative groups and their possible impact on the persecution of book titles in national libraries, identify topics most subject to censorship and the strategies used by these groups. 

Methodology: This is a bibliographical, documentary, and qualitative study, searching for newspaper reports on library censorship from 2013 to 2023 on the G1 portal, working with a corpus of 32 articles. Content analysis was subsequently used to analyze the episodes found. 

Results: The ten episodes found reported persecution of textbooks and literature distributed in several Brazilian cities. This censorship was promoted by the revolt of students' parents or through government agencies. In all the episodes, the targets were materials that addressed topics such as sexual orientation diversity, questioning the universal standard of the heteronormative family, or depicting the violence perpetrated during the 1964 dictatorship. 

Conclusion: After analyzing the data, it was considered that neoconservative movements have influence in the censorship of bibliographic materials, especially the School without Party movement, as it influences the organization of acts of persecution and proposed laws that allow censorship within school environments, and that it is the role of education and information professionals to resist in defense of a free school environment.