Deep dives: Bans, smartphones, and names

Not all of these literary and linguistic posts are serious as in somber, but they are serious in the amount of thought put into them.

• Double the book bans in half the time: Kelly Jensen, the resident book-ban expert, breaks down PEN America's latest report on reading restrictions in America (Book Riot).

• What phones are doing to reading: Jay Caspian Kang provides a both-sides look at how smartphones and technology have changed his reading strategies (The New Yorker).

• Do American family names make sense?: Take genealogy to the next level beyond looking at what your ancestors' name became over here and examine what the original or older version signified about them (Oxford University Press).