Renowned novelist says London board’s teaching ban of his book is like ‘burying our heads in the sand’

A prominent Canadian novelist is speaking out after a local high school teacher was ordered to stop teaching one of his award-winning novels in class because of its use of the N-word.

Lawrence Hill said the teacher, who works for the London District Catholic School Board (LDCSB), was told to stop teaching The Book of Negroes and that “under no circumstances am I to teach a novel using” the word.

“Although it may be well intentioned … my concern is that it essentially excludes, completely excludes, Black voices from the curriculum,” Hill told CBC Radio’s Afternoon Drive on Tuesday.

“Black musicians and screenwriters, and novelists like me, we go to that word as part of our lived experience, and when we do feel the need to use it, it’s in the context of writing about racial oppression or racial discrimination. It’s generally in the context of opposing it.”

In a recent op-ed in the Globe and Mail, Hill wrote he was contacted by the London teacher, who told him she had taught his novel to her Grade 12 students as required reading for 15 years. The N-word appears 23 times in his novel, Hill’s op-ed says. CBC News is not identifying the teacher.

“She told me that her board’s executive superintendent informed her that the word harms students, and that she was no longer allowed to require students to read any book containing the word. Instead, she was told, educators should focus on literature that celebrates ‘Black joy,'” Hill wrote in the op-ed.

Hill’s bestselling 2007 novel is a devastating portrayal of the slave trade as told through the life of one woman. It won several awards — including Canada Reads, the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize and The Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize — and was adapted into a CBC miniseries.

An LDCSB official told Hill that his book would still be available for student learning in libraries and classrooms. Students could also select it voluntarily for classroom novel study. However, they said, the board must be “mindful of the diverse sensitivities and experiences” of students.

“Due to the triggering language and content present in The Book of Negroes, and several students who have expressed concerns, we are not able to make it required/mandatory reading for formal assessment.”

In a statement to CBC, Mark Adkinson, the board’s spokesperson, said it was not banning or censoring books.

“However, we take an informed approach that certain books containing triggering language and content should not be required or mandatory reading for assessment in our schools,” he said.

He added that staff follow an internal discernment tool before considering use of a resource in class and all educators are expected to follow the Ontario curriculum.

Hill told CBC the word comes with a violent and atrocious history, but noted members of the Black community have reappropriated it and teens likely come across it multiple times a day already.

“The word abounds in Black culture today, so it’s sort of burying our heads in the sand if we think we’re protecting students from this word when they’re exposed to it all day long.”

He added it’s possible to discuss the word and the history of racism and violence against Black people without actually saying the word aloud in class.

“How are we to equip them to understand how difficult and painful a word can be, but how it can also abound in popular culture … if we don’t actually discuss the context in which these words are used?”

Alexandra Kane, a local activist and Black Lives Matter London organizer, believes the decision to bar Hill’s book from mandatory reading is a missed opportunity to learn how to talk about the book, as opposed to saying “we’re just not going to do it.”

The class is also the best place to have a discussion around the N-word, “not on the playground when it’s one white student ganging up on Black student, or a group of white students using the word to be funny and offensive,” she said.

“In schools, you learn about genocide and you learn about what happens in a war … There’s so much to discuss. But when it comes to Black history, it’s like, ‘Oh, I can’t! Oop, nope!'”

In making Hill’s book and others voluntary reading, Kane argued, it minimizes the attention their subject matter needs and deserves.

“How can you talk about anti-Black racism without the use of this word?” she said.

“We have an obligation to make sure our children and our younger generations understand the weight of this word and how to use it [in] learning about the racist histories we possess here in Canada and in the States.”

For more stories about the experiences of Black Canadians — from anti-Black racism to success stories within the Black community — check out Being Black in Canada, a CBC project Black Canadians can be proud of. You can read more stories here.