Word: cage
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
What is it about a book that lands it in the XR cage? The answer lies beyond the tiny locker-room, just past the grimy sink inside the bronze vault fitted for two padlocks and perhaps a bolt...
...books, which total about 2000 (no one seems to count) line both sides of a dimly-lit iron cage. The binding of each volume bears the pure white call-letters "XR" and a mysterious number (no one seems to know what they mean...
From this jumble of material in the XR cage, it is difficult to guess what criteria Harvard uses to condemn a book to the XR imprisonment. Sassow admits that there are no written cri- teria for judging XR books, and says there are inconsistencies in the classification. A quick check of the Widener card catalogue illustrates these inconsistencies. Of Widener's 39 books on homosexuality, for example, 30 are kept in the XR cage and nine in the stacks. On the other hand, only 11 of 79 books on prostitution are classified XR. The bias is clearly heterosexual...
...Most of the XR material relates to sex. Medical books are classified XR because people like to cut out nude pictures to hang up as pin-ups. If a book is banned in Boston, we will put it in the XR cage...
Both Sassow and Miss Haskins emphasize that an XR classification does not prevent the use of a book--except that library users cannot browse through the cage or remove the books from the reading room. Unfortunately, many students do not understand the XR system. A junior recalls hiking to the Biology Library as a freshman to get the Kinsey Report because he did not know Widener made it available for general use. The Bio Library also kept the book in a locked cabinet, and the freshman was allowed to read the book for one hour--with a matronly librarian hovering...