Comments on: Scrota and Other Unmentionables

By: Likely Stories » Blog Archive » Funny, She Doesn’t Look Like a Corruptor of Children’s Minds

Mon, 16 Jul 2007 19:08:33 +0000

[...] On AL Focus, Beverly Goldberg talks to Susan Patron about the scrotum flap brouhaha: Susan Patron’s book “The Higher Power of Lucky” became known for two things in the past year: winning the 2007 ALA Newberry Medal, and being at the center of an uproar when some school librarians removed the book because it contained the word “scrotum.” In this interview, conducted at the 2007 ALA Annual Conference, AL’s Beverly Goldberg speaks with Patron about that controversial word, connecting with young readers, and what she’s working on next. [...]

By: Likely Stories » Blog Archive » Fear of the Body, Part 2

Likely Stories » Blog Archive » Fear of the Body, Part 2 — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 16:26:07 +0000

[...] First there was fear of the scrotum. Now there is fear of the vagina. In Cross River, NY, three high-school students were suspended for using the word “vagina” while reading from…wait for it…The Vagina Monologues. From the Chicago Tribune (”Girls suspended for V-word“): The excerpt from “Monologues” was read Friday night, among various readings at an event sponsored by the literary magazine at John Jay High School in Cross River, a New York City suburb. Among the other readings was a student’s original work and the football coach quoting Shakespeare. [...]

By: Keir

Keir — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 18:34:58 +0000

From Carolyn Phelan, via Ilene Cooper, a link to a historical recap of the Great Scrotum Kerfuffle (with diagrams) at pix stix kids pix.

By: Keir

Keir — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 15:36:49 +0000

albinoike, I’m surprised to hear that you’re so upset to learn that Europeans are our literary cultural arbiters. Certainly I run every Likely Stories entry past my own personal Team Europe — Sven in Stockholm, Manfred in Munich, and Pierre in Paris — before I publish a word.

On a serious note, I used “Europeans” as shorthand for any country that’s evolved beyond our sometimes great nation in terms of puritanical prudishness. I was momentarily forgetting the hackles that the word “Europe” raises, even in a country settled largely by the descendants of Europeans.

But I take issue with your assertion that the word “scrotum” is vocabulary more appropriate for physicians. And you haven’t answered MY question: if not “scrotum,” what? Is there a cute, cuddly word for it? And do you also believe that children should be taught such non-clinical vocabulary as “wee-wee” and “tinkle”?

By: jennimi

jennimi — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 14:46:26 +0000

Great piece!!!! We’re not all the same!

I also love the Gaiman piece, of course.

By: albinoike

albinoike — Sat, 24 Feb 2007 18:24:42 +0000

Why is it that you look to Europe for approbation(or in this case supposed derision) as to the standards practiced in American bookdom? What is it exactly about the “Europeans” laughing that leaves you so discomfitted? Since when have the “Europeans” become our literary cultural arbiters? As to the inclusion of the word itself, “clinically appropriate” it certainly is. Whether it is appropriate clinically is a different question. Several hundred years of American children’s authors must not have been seeking the stamp of Euro high-brow approval when deciding to write to children in terms only a child could love and not those used by a clinical physician or med student.

By: Keir

Keir — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 21:26:37 +0000

This says it more eloquently than I did: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/21/opinion/21wed4.html

By: Frank Sennett

Frank Sennett — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 19:21:49 +0000

Colin Cotterill’s new Dr. Siri Paiboun mystery, which I have the pleasure of reviewing, finds the august national coroner of Laos contemplating a set of fried human testicles as his latest adventure begins. I’m sure Cotterill’s having a chuckle over this controversy, if he’s caught wind of it…

By: Bill Ott

Bill Ott — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 16:08:47 +0000

I’m way late on this comment, but I did want to stake Booklist’s–and my own–claims where the use of scrotum in print is concerned. In a Back Page column I wrote last May (“Jackets”) about the divinely trashy book jackets that adorn pulp-era paperbacks, I referred to an especially nice example of the genre as a “scrotum-tingler.” But, full disclosure here, as I noted in the column, it wasn’t really my phrase. I was paraphrasing John Dunning in his novel “The Bookwoman’s Last Fling.” Dunning’s character, Cliff Janeway, a rare book dealer, refers at one point to a book jacket that makes his “scrotum tingle.” So, while I’m thrilled that the Newbery now has a scrotum, I must remind the world that Booklist had one first.

By: Scrota and other unmentionables - Censur Net

Scrota and other unmentionables - Censur Net — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 12:09:17 +0000

[...] Marcela Valente* Posted in Censur Net News [...]

By: Keir

Keir — Thu, 22 Feb 2007 18:35:16 +0000

Thanks, Carolyn! I especially love the helpful list of scrotum-related titles.

I’m compelled to confess that I’ve never read any of Neil Gaiman’s books. But every time I read his blog, I like it. So I’m adding a permanent link right now.

By: Carolyn

Carolyn — Thu, 22 Feb 2007 15:18:40 +0000

Keir, come out from under the bed and read Neil Gaiman's take on the controversy. Yes, he's in Europe. Okay, he's laughing. But you'll be laughing too after reading http://www.neilgaiman.com/journal/2007/02/absence-of-scrota-your-guide-to-quality.html Actually, even the URL makes me laugh.