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Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Death in Crete


In Prehistoric Crete: Regional and Diachronic Studies on Mortuary Systems, editor Joanne M.A. Murphy (Classical Studies) brings together a group of essays that present "a diverse sample of contemporary scholarship on Crete." Archaeologists, divided by the time periods they study as well as locale, have built research silos, and Murphy seeks to bridge that gap with this volume.

As the publisher notes, "since the inception of Minoan archaeology, studies pertaining to tombs and tomb deposits have played seminal roles in our understanding of Minoan culture and the reconstruction of Bronze Age society. For several geographical areas and chronological periods of Cretan history, tombs are the most abundant source of data. Each author in this volume take a clear and distinct approach . . . including some that emphasize political geography . . . some that examine the commemoration of the dead . . . and others that underline the overlap between mortuary rituals and religion."

In addition to editing the book, Murphy contributed the introduction and a chapter entitled "Landscape and Social Narrative: A Study of Regional Social Structures in Prepalatial Crete."

Friday, December 2, 2011

What to do with data--new book by Lynda Kellam

UNCG's University Libraries are fortunate to have data services librarian Lynda Kellam on hand to guide students, staff, and faculty through the ever-growing world of numeric data resources. The World Bank and other NGOs and government agencies have opened up tremendous amounts of data on climate change, nutrition, education, and much much more, and at UNCG, our researchers can turn to Kellam to navigate the numbers. But smaller libraries typically are unable to employ data experts. That's where Kellam's Numeric Data Services and Sources for the General Reference Librarian comes to the rescue. Numeric Data Services provides librarians everywhere the tools they need to develop data services. As London School of Economics and Political Science Data Manager Tanvi Desai blogs,

"This guidebook serves as a primer to developing and supporting social science statistical and numeric data sources in the academic library. It provides strategies for the establishment of data services and offers short descriptions of the essential sources of free and commercial social science statistical and numeric data. Finally, it discusses the future of numeric data services, including the integration of statistics and data into library instruction and the use of Web 2.0 tools to visualize data."

To learn more about Kellam's research and how to incorporate statistics into library instruction, listen as Kellam sits down with the creators of Adventures in Library Instruction.

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Advancing Your Career: Getting and Making the Most of Your Doctorate


Emeritus Professor Dale Brubaker, Educational Leadership and Cultural Foundations, recently published Advancing Your Career: Getting and Making the Most of Your Doctorate, a book co-authored with his son, Michael Brubaker.

Advancing Your Career is appropriate for the reader considering applying to graduate school, to the student in the midst of assistantships and exams, to the researcher embarking on a dissertation, to the newly-minted Ph.D, to the graduate professor advising a new crop of students. The book provides a road map of what to expect and advice on how to navigate issues such as selecting a committee and "The 'Table Manners' of Doctoral Student Leadership."

John Hattie, Director of the Melbourne Education Research Institute, University of Melbourne, calls Advancing Your Career "the book that all doctoral students, advisors, and supervisors need to read to know what to do next. It maximizes the fun and worthwhile aspects of completing the thesis and degree while remaining realistic to the fact that it may not all be a bed of roses. The authors helped me hear the voices of the students--the caring striving, thriving, and surviving.

Ronald Williamson, Professor of Educational Leadership, Eastern Michigan University, notes "It's about time someone had the courage to talk about the joys and the challenges of doctoral study. In Advancing Your Career the discussion is open, honest, and takes the mystery out of the process. It also provides students with a set of tools they can use to reflect on their own experience. The ability to critique your own work and to maneuver through the politics of the doctorate are important to your skill as a researcher. That's exactly why Advancing Your Career is such an important addition to the literature."

Blaire Cholewa, Assistant Professor of Counselor Education, Kean University, says that "Brubaker and Brubaker have created a wonderful, detailed map that simplifies and demystifies the often grueling journey of obtaining a doctorate. This book provides invaluable information and insight for every step of the doctoral process and gives readers an honest account of the hurdles to come as well as provides them with the tools to prevail. I only wish such a book had existed to help me navigate my own doctoral journey."

Friday, October 7, 2011

Book Talk on November 8--Choices Women Make: Agency in Domestic Violence, Assisted Reproduction, and Sex Work




Dr. Carisa Showden, Political Science, will discuss her new book, Choices Women Make: Agency in Domestic Violence, Assisted Reproduction, and Sex Work, at the Multicultural Resource Center in the EUC on Tuesday, November 8, at 4 pm.

Dr. Showden's book, published earlier this year, examines women's agency in several contexts. As the publisher (University of Minnesota Press) describes:

"In
Showden’s analysis, women’s agency emerges as an individual and social construct, rooted in concrete experience, complex and changing over time. She traces the development and deployment of agency, illustrating how it plays out in the messy workings of imperfect lives. In a series of case studies, she considers women within situations of intimate partner violence, reproductive decision making, and sex work such as prostitution and pornography. Each narrative offers insight into how women articulate their self-understanding and political needs in relation to the pressures they confront."

For further reading, see Dr. Showden's post on the University of Minnesota Press' blog. Here she takes on the "mainstream" view of domestic violence, as articulated in a recent Glamour article, exploring the question of women's agency in abusive relationships and challenging the assumption that all women have more options:

"What the article misses in framing the question in this way is that while some women indisputably do have more options—and more to the point, more good options—than they did forty or fifty years ago, not all women do. To have 'good choices' available, material resources have to be more widely distributed, gender norms (what we might in our philosophical language call 'discursive resources') have to change, and laws and public policies have to support an array of ways that women and men deal with ending abuse. So women have 'more choices than ever' only to the degree that they have increased access to healthcare, good jobs, day care, supportive friends and family networks, full citizenship status, mobility, access to legal interventions that enable them to negotiate effectively with their partners when needed, and a strong enough sense of self to buck gender norms about responsibility for the maintenance of relationships and being a good partner. Not all women have most of these resources."

Friday, September 16, 2011

Two Books by Craig Nova, English Department


Noted novelist and UNCG faculty member Craig Nova (English) is attracting favorable notice for two recent publications.

Earlier this year, Nova re-issued an expanded version of his memoir Brook Trout and the Writing Life, a book that looks at writing, marriage, fatherhood, and fishing (including fishing with the FBI!). As Kirkus Reviews describes, "One of Nova's great strengths as a novelist is his unerring eye for natural detail....The book is unflinchingly candid about both the writing process and the hard work of marriage, each of which is seen intertwined with his fishing and his love of nature."





In 2010, Nova published The Informer, a political crime novel. John Irving praised the book, noting,

"There are three elements in a Craig Nova novel that you can rely on. First, there is the indelible atmosphere--in the case of The Informer, this is Berlin in the 1930s, and the atmosphere is both brutal and mystifying, because everyone seems capable of betraying anyone. The second element is that there are characters who know they're in trouble, but they have underestimated how much trouble they're in, and they are unsure in regard to which of the other characters they should fear most. The third and most important element is that these characters, and their entwined stories, are on a meticulously plotted collision course. . . . This is a dark but fantastic novel."

Friday, September 2, 2011

Dr. Elizabeth Bucar (Religious Studies) Book Talk on Tuesday, Sept. 13, 4 p.m.



Dr. Elizabeth Bucar, of the Department of Religious Studies, recently published Creative Conformity: The Feminist Politics of U.S. Catholic and Iranian Shi'i Women. She will talk about the book at the Multicultural Resource Center, EUC, on Tuesday, Sept. 13 at 4 p.m.

Read more about the book (taken from the Georgetown University Press blog):

"Much feminist scholarship has viewed Catholicism and Shi’i Islam as two religious traditions that, historically, have greeted feminist claims with skepticism or outright hostility. Creative Conformity: The Feminist Politics of U.S. Catholic and Iranian Shi'i Women demonstrates how certain liberal secular assumptions about these religious traditions are only partly correct and, more importantly, misleading. In this highly original study, Elizabeth Bucar compares the feminist politics of eleven U.S. Catholic and Iranian Shi’i women and explores how these women contest and affirm clerical mandates in order to expand their roles within their religious communities and national politics.

Using scriptural analysis and personal interviews, Creative Conformity demonstrates how women contribute to the production of ethical knowledge within both religious communities in order to expand what counts as feminist action, and to explain how religious authority creates an unintended diversity of moral belief and action. Bucar finds that the practices of Catholic and Shi’a women are not only determined by but also contribute to the ethical and political landscape in their respective religious communities. She challenges the orthodoxies of liberal feminist politics and, ultimately, strengthens feminism as a scholarly endeavor.

Friday, July 15, 2011

Working Subjects in Early Modern English Drama


Professor Michelle Dowd (English) has co-edited a new volume, Working Subjects in Early Modern English Drama, that addresses the emerging ways that work was represented on the English stage in the 16th and 17th Centuries. As the publisher's website describes:

"The essays assembled here address fascinating and hitherto unexplored questions raised by the subject of labor as it was taken up in the drama of the period: How were laboring bodies and the goods they produced, marketed and consumed represented onstage through speech, action, gesture, costumes and properties? How did plays participate in shaping the identities that situated laboring subjects within the social hierarchy? In what ways did the drama engage with contemporary discourses (social, political, economic, religious, etc.) that defined the cultural meanings of work? How did players and playwrights define their own status with respect to the shifting boundaries between high status/low status, legitimate/illegitimate, profitable/unprofitable, skilled/unskilled, formal/informal, male/female, free/bound, paid/unpaid forms of work? Merchants, usurers, clothworkers, cooks, confectioners, shopkeepers, shoemakers, sheepshearers, shipbuilders, sailors, perfumers, players, magicians, servants and slaves are among the many workers examined in this collection."

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Michael Parker's Latest Novel Garners Favorable Reviews from Magazines and Newspapers Across the Country



Last month, English Professor Michael Parker published his fifth novel, The Watery Part of the World, and it has drawn the attention of the national media. The book's website offers the following synopsis:

"Michael Parker has created a wholly original world from two known facts: (1) Theodosia Burr Alston, daughter of the controversial vice president Aaron Burr, disappeared in 1813 while en route by schooner from South Carolina to New York; and (2) in 1970, two elderly white women and one black man were the last townspeople to leave a small barrier island off the coast of North Carolina.

In this fiction based on historical fact, Parker weaves a tale of adventure and longing as he charts one hundred and fifty years in the life and death of an island and its inhabitants—the descendants of Theodosia Burr Alston and those of the freed man whose family would be forever tethered to hers.

It’s a tale of pirates and slaves, treason and treasures, madness and devotion, that takes place on a tiny island battered by storms, infested with mosquitoes, and cut off from the world—as difficult to get to as it is impossible to leave for those who call it home. From Theodosia’s capture at sea to the passionate lives of her great-great-great-granddaughters to the tender story of the black man who cares for them all his days, this is an inspired novel about love, trust, and the often tortuous bonds of family and community."

The New York Times Book Review calls Parker's prose "vivid with local color," and The Los Angeles Times notes that "The entire novel has a blue-green, underwater feel, a timeless forgetfulness."

For more about The Watery Part of the World, its critical reception, and Parker's other works, please visit his website.

Monday, April 18, 2011

Another Corleone: Another Sicily--Screening of Documentary by Professor Anthony Fragola on Thursday, April 21


Professor Anthony Fragola, Media Studies, will lead a discussion at the premiere of his film, Another Corleone: Another Sicily, at the Weatherspoon Museum on Thursday, April 21 at 6:00 pm (the screening starts at 6:30 pm). The event, part of the UNCG Sustainability Film and Dialogue Series, is free and open to the public.

Another Corleone: Another Sicily focuses on the lands confiscated from the Mafia in Corleone, the town made famous, or infamous, by Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather. Fragola shows the realities of the heroic struggles of the Sicilian people to reclaim their land and dignity from the bloody Mafia chiefs of Corleone who waged a war of terror against the Italian state. Another Corleone: Another Sicily illustrates the progress of these cooperatives to form self-sustaining ventures that provide meaningful work and economic freedom from Mafia control by prodicing organically grown products. (description taken from film's publicity)

For more information about the screening, please call or email Sarah Dorsey, 336.334.5610, sbdorsey@uncg.edu.

The University Libraries will make the film available to our patrons in the coming months.

Thursday, March 31, 2011

Time for a Book Party

On April 7, at 4 pm, the University Libraries will celebrate all the books edited or authored by UNCG faculty between January, 2010 and March 31, 2011. We received more than 40 books that were published in this timeframe. We want to extend our thanks the faculty from 23 different departments who alerted us to the publication of their books. The books include a poetry translation, textbooks, collections of essays, and monographs on topics from nursing management, to art criticism, to George Herbert, to social change. Two of the books were written by emeritus faculty members Robert Calhoon (History) and Richard Cox (School of Music, Theatre, and Dance).

Special thanks to the Office of the Provost for co-sponsoring the reception, which will take place on April 7 at 4pm in the Jackson Library Reading Room.

A full list of titles (alphabetized by department) is below. If we missed your book, or if your book will be published soon, please let us know, and we will be sure to include you in next year's celebration.

Omar Ali, African American Studies, In the Lion's Mouth.

Ann Millett-Gallant, Art and Liberal Studies, The Disabled Body in Contemporary Art.

Nir Kshetri, Business Administration, The Global Cybercrime Industry: Economic, Institutional and Strategic Perspectives.

Jennifer Yurchisin, Consumer, Apparel, and Retail Studies, Fashion and the Consumer.

Albert N. Link, Economics, Public Goods, Public Gains.

Dale Brubaker and Misti Williams, Educational Leadership and Cultural Foundations, Why the Principalship?: Making the Leap from the Classroom.

Svi Shapiro, Educational Leadership and Cultural Foundations, Educating Youth for a World Beyond Violence.

Christopher Hodgkins, English, George Herbert's Pastoral: New Essays on the Poet and Priest of Bemerton.

Christian Moraru, English, Postcommunism, Postmodernism, and the Global Imagination.

Christian Moraru, English, Cosmoderism.

Mark Rifkin, English, When Did Indians Become Straight?: Kinship, the History of Sexuality, and Native Sovereignty.

Kelly Ritter, English, Who Owns School? Authority, Students, and Online Discourse.

Robert M. Calhoon, History, Tory Insurgents.

Mark Elliott, History, Undaunted Radical: The Selected Writings and Speeches of Albion W. Tourgee.

David H. Demo, Human Development and Family Studies, Beyond the Average Divorce.

Hamid Nemati, Information Systems and Operations Management, Pervasive Information Security and Privacy Development: Trends and Advancements.

Hamid Nemati, Information Systems and Operations Management, Security and Privacy Assurance in Advancing Technologies.

Hamid Nemati Information Systems and Operations Management, Applied Cryptography for Cyber Security and Defense.

Jo Ramsay Leimenstoll, Interior Architecture, Thomas Day: Master Craftsman and Free Man of Color.

Donald A. Hodges, Music Education, Music in the Human Experience: An Introduction to Music Psychology.

Laura J. Fero, Charlotte A. Herrick, and Jie Hu, Nursing, Introduction to Care Coordination and Nursing Management.

Joshua Hoffman and Gary Rosenkrantz, Philosophy, An Historical Dictionary of Metaphysics.

Susan Buck, Political Science, Public Administration in Theory and Practice.

Heidi Gazelle, Psychology, Social Anxiety in Childhood: Bridging Developmental and Clinical Perspectives.

Jacquelyn White, Psychology, Violence Against Women and Children: Mapping the Terrain.

Jacquelyn White, Psychology, Violence Against Women and Children: Navigating Solutions.

Paul Silvia, Psychology, Public Speaking for Psychologists.

Charles Orzech, Religious Studies, Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras of East Asia.

Ana Hontanilla, Romance Languages, El Gusto De La Razon.

Mark Smith-Soto, Romance Languages, Fever Season And Other Poems: A Bilingual Edition Selected and Translated by Mark Smith-Soto.

Richard Cox, School of Music, Theatre, and Dance, The Choral Music of Benjamin Britten : A Conductor's Guide.

Martica Bacallao, Social Work, Becoming Bicultural: Risk, Resilience, and Latino Youth.

Robert Wineburg, Social Work, Pracademics and Community Change.

Ken Allan, Sociology, A Primer in Social & Sociological Theory: An Invitation to Democracy.

Ken Allan, Sociology, Contemporary Social and Sociological Theory, 2nd edition.

Ken Allan, Sociology, Explorations in Classical Sociological Theory: Seeing the Social World, 2nd edition.

Sarah Daynes, Sociology, Time and Memory in Reggae Music.

CP Gause, Teacher Education and Higher Education, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusive Education: A Voice from the Margins.

Francine Johnston, Teacher Education and Higher Education, Words Their Way with Struggling Readers: Word Study for Reading, Vocabulary, and Spelling Instruction, Grades 4 - 12.

Dale Schunk, Teacher Education and Higher Education, Handbook of Self-Regulation of Learning and Performance.

Deborah Bell, Theatre, Mask Makers and Their Craft: An Illustrated Worldwide Study.

James Fisher, Theatre, Miller in an Hour.

James Fisher, Theatre, Wilder in an Hour.

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Violence Against Women and Children--Mapping the Terrain and Navigating the Solutions



The University Libraries were delighted when the American Psychological Association (APA) donated this landmark two volume series on domestic violence co-edited by Professor Jacquelyn White of UNCG's Department of Psychology. Thank you Dr. White for bringing the libraries' program to your publisher's attention!

The APA describes that the books are designed "to provide consensus recommendations for researchers, practitioners, advocates, policymakers, and all those who seek more effective responses to interpersonal violence."

In the first volume, Mapping the Terrain,"experts from diverse disciplines describe prevalence rates among various populations; risk factors for perpetration and vulnerability and protective factors for potential victims. They also document the impact of violence on the victims in terms of psychological, reproductive, maternal and child health, and behavioral and economic consequences. In the process, they establish commonalities across child abuse, sexual and domestic violence, and suggest vital next steps for collaborative efforts."

In the second volume, Navigating Solutions, "eminent scholars use a public health model to examine current societal responses to interpersonal violence. Authors examine the efficacy of medical and psychological treatments for victims, families, and perpetrators, as well as justice system responses to various forms of child abuse, sexual violence, and domestic violence. Interventions are suggested at several levels of prevention, including initiatives designed to eradicate the problem (primary prevention), reduce it among those at risk (secondary prevention), and minimize the negative consequences of violence and stabilize health (tertiary prevention). Finally, the editors present an integrative conclusion that provides a sound foundation for future responses across practice, research, advocacy and policy, at the local and national level."

We expect the volumes to be valuable to researchers and students in several disciplines and again want to thank the APA for their generosity.

Monday, February 14, 2011

Playwrights in an Hour -- Miller, O'Neill, and Wilder




Professor James Fisher, the chair of UNCG's Department of Theatre, has contributed three volumes to the new series, Playwrights in an Hour, a series that "offers in compact form the information needed for a basic understanding and appreciation of the works of each volume's featured playwright." With his volumes on Arthur Miller, Eugene O'Neill, and Thornton Wilder, Fisher presents brief biographical sketches of his subjects and places them within a broader cultural context. Wright touches as well on the critical reception of the playwrights' works and traces their influences.

Monday, January 10, 2011

Why the Principalship? Making the Leap from the Classroom


In this book, Dale Brubaker, professor emeritus, and Misti Williams, clinical assistant professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and Cultural Foundations, guide teachers who want to make the leap from the classroom to administration. The book is especially timely as UNCG recently launched a new initiative, the Piedmont Triad Leadership Academy, thanks to a $6 million grant from the State of North Carolina, to identify and train aspiring principals for high-need schools.

The book has received high praise from Susan Jacoby, former education writer for the Washington Post and the New York Times:

Anyone who ever attended a school overseen by a bad principal ought to be able to answer the question posed in the title of Why the Principalship? Gifted teachers form the most powerful memories of education for students, but the principal is responsible for creating the atmosphere in which the best teachers either flourish or wither. A great principal is, above all, the school's head teacher. The only thing I would add to this lively, informative, encouraging book is that an excellent principal ought to keep one foot--or at least a toe--in the classroom. At a time when education has never been more crucial to the future of our nation, and public schools are under attack from all sides, there has never been a greater need for school administrators who understand that their job is to be leaders true to the Latin root of the word educate, which means to 'lead out.'"