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Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Elliott Carter's 'What Next?' by Guy Capuzzo





Guy Capuzzo (Music, Theatre and Dance) has published Elliot Carter's What Next? Communication, Cooperation, and Separation.

According to a review by John Link of William Paterson University, "Guy Capuzzo presents a detailed analysis of one of Elliott Carter's most ambitious and enigmatic compositions. In elucidating the inner workings of Carter's musical language he makes a significant contribution to Carter scholarship, and to the literature of contemporary music theory."

More information about this publication can be found on the authors website.



Tuesday, November 20, 2012

SAGE Handbook of Mentoring and Coaching in Education by Carol A. Mullen


Professor Carol A. Mullen (Education) has published The SAGE Handbook of Mentoring and Coaching in Education.

According to the publisher, this Handbook is a leading source of ideas and information on mentoring and coaching. It covers national and international research on schools, higher education, and disciplines within and beyond education. The editors draw together contributions and present evidence bases and alternative worldviews in which concepts are both untangled and substantiated. Unique in its coverage, it maps current knowledge and understanding, and values and skills underpinning educational mentoring and coaching for learning. Contributors set out practical applications of coaching and mentoring for practitioners and researchers and also address social justice issues, such as those involving traditional and technical forms of mentoring and coaching, democratic and accountability agendas, and institutional and historical patterns of learning.

Thursday, November 15, 2012

Families in Crisis in the Old South by Loren Schweninger


Families in crisis in the Old South : divorce, slavery, and the law


Professor Loren Schweninger has published Families in Crisis in the Old South: Divorce, Slavery and the Law. In this book, Schweninger explores the impact of divorce and separation on white families and on the enslaved and provides insights on issues including domestic violence, interracial adultery, alcoholism, insanity, and property relations in the antebellum South.

The University Libraries collaborated with Professor Schweninger on the Digital Library on American Slavery, a searchable database of detailed personal information about slaves, slaveholders, and free people of color.  Freely available and open to the public, the database includes information from legislative and county court petitions, as well as other legal documents, that Professor Schweninger uncovered over an eighteen-year period.

Learn more about Professor Schweninger and his reserarch on his UNCG homepage and the publisher's website.

Monday, November 12, 2012

Mochlos IIC: Period IV. The Mycenaean Settlement and Cemetery by Jeffrey Soles


Mochlos IIC, Period IV: The Mycenaean Settlement and Cemetery - The Human Remains and Other Finds (Prehistory Monographs)

Professor Jeffrey Soles (Classical Studies) has published Mochlos IIC: Period IV. The Mycenaean Settlement and Cemetery: The Human Remains and Other Finds. This book catalogs, discusses and presents illustrations of the artifacts, human remains, grave goods, and ecofactual material from 31 tombs and 11 houses that were excavated from the Late Minoan III settlement and cemetery at Mochlos in eastern Crete.

Learn more about Dr. Soles and his current excavation projects on his UNCG homepage.

Thursday, November 8, 2012

Creolization and Contraband by Linda M. Rupert



Professor Linda M. Rupert (History) has published Creolization and Contraband: Curaco in the Early Modern Atlantic World, a book that explores the language, commerce and cultural exchange of Curaco.

According to the publisher, Creolization and Contraband uses the history of Curaçao to develop the first book-length analysis of the relationship between illicit interimperial trade and processes of social, cultural, and linguistic exchange in the early modern world. Rupert argues that by breaking through multiple barriers, smuggling opened particularly rich opportunities for cross-cultural and interethnic interaction. Far from marginal, these extra-official exchanges were the very building blocks of colonial society.

Additional information about this book can be found on the authors homepage

Monday, November 5, 2012

Elements of Culture by Susan Andreatta

Elements of Culture:…,9781111830007

Professor Susan Andreatta has co-authored the Book Elements of Culture: an Applied Perspective.  According to the publisher, Elements of Culture is a concise new text that allows you to quickly access the main concepts in cultural anthropology. The book's streamlined content, pedagogy, and real-world applications showcase global current events and issues that illustrate the usefulness of anthropology in careers and in solving societal problems.

Learn more about Susan Andreatta on her UNCG homepage

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Trouble in the West, by Stephen Ruzicka

Trouble in the west : Egypt and the Persian Empire, 525-332 BCE



Professor Stephen Ruzicka (History) has published Trouble in the West: Egypt and the Persian Empire, 525-332 BC.  According to the publisher, "this book provides the first full and continuous account of the Persian-Egyptian War, a conflict that continued for nearly the two-hundred-year duration of the Persian Empire. Despite its status as the largest of all ancient Persian military enterprises--including any aimed at Greece--this conflict has never been reconstructed in any detailed and comprehensive way. Thus, Trouble in the West adds tremendously to our understanding of Persian imperial affairs. At the same time, it dramatically revises our understanding of eastern Mediterranean and Aegean affairs by linking Persian dealings with Greeks and other peoples in the west to Persia's fundamental, ongoing Egyptian concerns. In this study, Stephen Ruzicka argues that Persia's Egyptian problem and, conversely, Egypt's Persian problem, were much more important in the eastern Mediterranean and Aegean worlds than our conventional Greek-centered perspective and sources have allowed us to see. In looking at this conflict as one stage in an enduring east-west conflict between successive Near Eastern imperial powers and Egypt--one which stretched across nearly the whole of ancient history--it represents an important turning point: by pulling in remote western states and peoples, who subsequently became masters of Egypt, western opposition to Near Eastern power was sustained right up to the 7th century Arab conquests. For classicists and historians of the ancient Near East, Trouble in the West will serve as a valuable, and long-overdue, resource."

Thursday, October 25, 2012

Life After Death Row by Saundra Westervelt



Professor Saundra D. Westervelt (sociology) has co-authored the book, Life After Death Row: Exonerees’ Search for Community and Identity.  The book, which chronicles the lives of 18 death row exonerees as they struggle to reclaim their lives after being set free, examines how policy changes could mitigate those struggles for others.

More information about the author and this book can be found in the campus news section of the UNCG Website and on the publisher's website.

Thursday, October 11, 2012

The Erotics of Sovereignty by Mark Rifkin





from the publisher's website:

In 1970 the Nixon administration inaugurated a new era in federal Indian policy. No more would the U.S. government seek to deny and displace Native peoples or dismantle Native governments; from now on federal policy would promote “the Indian’s sense of autonomy without threatening his sense of community."

In The Erotics of Sovereignty, Mark Rifkin [English] offers a telling perspective on what such a policy of self-determination has meant and looks at how contemporary queer Native writers use representations of sensation to challenge official U.S. accounts of Native identity. Rifkin focuses on four Native writers—Qwo-Li Driskill (Cherokee), Deborah Miranda (Esselen), Greg Sarris (Graton Rachería), and Chrystos (Menominee)—approaching their fiction and poetry as forms of political theory. 

Rifkin shows how the work of these queer or two-spirit Native writers affirms the significance of the erotic as an exercise of individual and community sovereignty. In this way, we come to see how their work contests the homophobic, sexist, and exclusivist policies and attitudes of tribal communities as well as those of the nation-state. 

Professor Rifkin's previous book, When Did Indians Become Straight?: Kinship, the History of Sexuality, and Native Sovereignty (2011) was recently awarded the prestigious John Hope Franklin Prize in American Studies.    Please see the Department of English's website for more information on Professor Mark Rifkin and his published works. 

Thursday, October 4, 2012

The Hidden Treasure of Black ASL: Its History and Structure by Joseph Hill




Dr. Joseph Hill (Specialized Education Services) is a co-author of the recent book, The Hidden Treasure of Black ASL: Its History and Structure  (Gallaudet University Press).   Many people are at least somewhat familiar with American Sign Language, but few are aware that, like any other language, sign language can have dialects and other variations. According to one review, this book and its companion DVD “present the first empirical study that begins to fill in the linguistic gaps about Black ASL.”

The separation of  black and white deaf children was a contributing factor to the development of distinct dialects of ASL.  This book is an important step in understanding how and why such divisions occur and the extent of their ramifications. The growing interest in multicultural education ensures that it will reach an interested audience.

Please see the UNCG website for an in-depth article about Dr. Hill and his book.

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Learning Theories: An Educational Perspective, by Dale H. Schunk



Professor Dale H. Schunk, Education, has published Learning Theories: An Educational Perspective. According to the publisher, this book is "an essential resource for understanding the main principles, concepts and research findings of key learning theories - especially as they relate to education - this proven text blends theory, research and applications throughout, providing its readers with a coherent and unified perspective on learning in educational settings."

Thursday, September 27, 2012

Understanding Richard Hoggart by Ben Clarke




Professor Ben Clarke, English, has recently published Understanding Richard Hoggart: A Pedgogy of Hope.  According to the publisher, it "is a timely reevaluation of this foundational figure in Cultural Studies, a critical but friendly review of both Hoggart's work and reputation."

The book "uses new archival sources to critically evaulate Hoggart's contribution and influence, set his work in context, and determine its current relevance."

According to James Curran of Goldsmiths,University of London, this publication is a "a fascinating and insightful analysis of a leading public intellectual, obsessive auto-biographer, founder of a new academic discipline and original cultural critic."

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Public Investments in Energy Technology by Albert Link




Professor Albert Link, Economics, has recently published Public Investments in Energy Technology, a book that, according to its publisher, "addresses the social importance of new energy technologies, illustrates policy-relevant applications of evaluation techniques and proposes new perspectives for a US energy investment strategy."  

Link and his fellow authors, "through detailed examples related to solar, geothermal, and vehicle technologies . . . outline the need for robust evaluation methods to document social returns to taxpayers' R&D investments. They argue that such evaluations are necessary for the public sector to make rational decisions about the allocation of its scares resources. The evaluation methods considered involve developing alternative technology and market pathways from which the benefits of government research can be measured. Researchers and graduate students, policy makers involved in energy technology, and energy R&D program managers will all find much of value in this important and timely book."  

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Language and Reading Disabilities, Alan G. Kamhi



Alan G. Kamhi, Professor, Department of Communicative Sciences and Disorders 

Written by leading experts, the third edition of Language and Reading Disabilities, maintains its strong clinical focus and thorough coverage of the identification, assessment, and treatment of reading and writing disorders.

This text explores the differences between spoken and written language, the basic factors in reading and language development, the stages of reading development, as well as how to define and classify reading disabilities and understand their clinical implications. Coverage includes how to assess phonemic awareness, word recognition, reading comprehension and the relationship between spelling and other literacy skills, and writing foundations and processes.

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

A Community of Disagreement: Feminism in the University


Dr. Danielle Bouchard (Women's and Gender Studies) recently published A Community of Disagreement: Feminism in the University.  A close look at women’s placement and displacement in the academic setting, the book is part of the Counterpoints series, published by Peter Lang. According to the company, “Counterpoints publishes the most compelling and imaginative books being written in education today.”

Described by reviewers as provocative and compelling, the book examines “feminism’s relationship to what has become one of the central missions of the U.S. university: the management of difference." In short,  Dr. Bouchard’s book is a timely and valuable addition to the growing body of scholarship on the role of women in higher education.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Print Culture in Early Modern France: Abraham Bosse and the Purposes of Print


Author of Print Culture in Early Modern France: Abraham Bosse and the Purposes of Print, Professor Carl Goldstein, has been a guest lecturer at the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., the Walters Gallery, Baltimore, the Liebieghaus, Frankfurt, Germany, and the Louvre, Paris, France.

"In this book, Carl Goldstein examines the print culture of seventeenth-century France through a study of the career of Abraham Bosse, a well-known printmaker, book illustrator, and author of books and pamphlets on a variety of technical subjects. The consummate print professional, Bosse persistently explored the endless possibilities of print – single-sheet prints combining text and image, book illustration, broadsides, placards, almanacs, theses, and pamphlets. Bosse had a profound understanding of print technology as a fundamental agent of change. Unlike previous studies, which have largely focused on the printed word, this book demonstrates the extent to which the contributions of an individual printmaker and the visual image are fundamental to understanding the nature and development of early modern print culture."-Cambridge Books Online

Print Culture in Early Modern France is available in print at Jackson Library and .pdfs of the text are available at Cambridge Books Online.

To Know Her Own History: Writing at the Woman's College, 1943-1963


To Know Her Own History: Writing at the Woman's College, 1943-1963 was written by Associate Professor Kelly Ritter. Dr. Ritter is a faculty member in UNCG's Department of English.

"Kelly Ritter chronicles the evolution of writing programs at a landmark Southern women’s college during the postwar period. She finds that despite its conservative Southern culture and vocational roots, the Woman’s College of the University of North Carolina was a unique setting where advanced writing programs and creativity flourished long before these trends emerged nationally."-University of Pittsburgh Press

Associate Professor Wendy Sharer from the Department of English at East Carolina University calls Dr. Ritter's work, “A fascinating and instructive reminder that there is no history of composition: there are histories of composition, conflicted and filled with politically and culturally constructed understandings of gender, race, class, ethnicity, and—as this book in particular makes clear—geographical region and disciplinary identity. This thoroughly researched local history adds a needed layer of complexity to the historical frameworks that have informed archives-based scholarship in composition studies.”

To Know Her Own History: Writing at the Woman's College, 1943-1963 is available from Jackson Library and as downloadable .pdfs on Project Muse.

Case Studies in Global Entrepreneurship

Dr. Dianne Welsh  is the Hayes Distinguished Professor of Entrepreneurship at The University of North Carolina, Greensboro in the Bryan School of Business and Economics. Dr. Welsh, one of the editors of Case Studies in Global Entrepreneurship, is a leader in her field and was invited by the United Nations to speak on Entrepreneurship, Commercialization, and Innovation. The publisher explains that the current version of Case Studies in Global Entrepreneurship:
  • Is a user-friendly, easy-to-read compilation of global cases that explain the principles that come from entrepreneurship, international business, cross-cultural management, strategy, exporting, international education, international economics and environmental concerns, and leadership.
  • Includes cases based on the authors’ and contributing authors’ experiences around the world; including work in the former U.S.S.R, Afghanistan, Australia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, Zimbabwe, and more.
  • Presents each case with questions that apply the basic principles of global entrepreneurship, a teaching note with case overview, learning objectives, relevant courses, data sources, analysis with discussion questions and answers and references.
  • Focuses on real dilemmas, opportunities and challenges from an entrepreneurship perspective.

Democratic Science Teaching: Building the Expertise to Empower Low-Income Minority Youth in Science


Assistant Professor Edna Tan, faculty member of the Department of Teacher Education and Higher Education at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, is one of the editors of Democratic Science Teaching: Building the Expertise to Empower Low-Income Minority Youth in Science.

The publisher's website says, "Democratic science pedagogy has the potential to shape learning outcomes and science engagement by taking on directly issues of pedagogy, learning,and social justice. In this text we provide a framework for democratic science teaching in order to interrogate the purposes and goals of science education in classrooms globally, as well as to call attention to ways of being in the classroom that position teachers and students as important and powerful participants in their own learning and as change-agents of a larger global society. We develop three core conceptual tools for democratic science teaching, that together frame ways of thinking and being in classrooms that work towards a more just world: Voice, Authority, and Critical Science Literacy. Each conceptual tool is developed in the introductory chapters then taken up in different pedagogical and analytic ways in the chapters that span the text. The chapters present researcher, teacher, and student centered lenses for investigating democratic science education and reflect elementary through high school education, both in school and out of school, in the US and globally."

Jackson library holds this book in both print and electronic formats.

Cultivating Race: The Expansion of Slavery in Georgia


 Dr. Watson Jennison is an assistant professor in UNCG's Department of History and author of Cultivating Race: The Expansion of Slavery in Georgia, 1750-1860. Claudio Saunt, author of Black, White, and Indian: Race and the Unmaking of an American Family, praises Dr. Jennison's book saying, "Colonial Georgia has long been known as 'the debatable land' contested by the British and Spanish crowns. That imperial conflict, as Watson Jennison shows, was the tip of the iceberg. In a sweeping account, Jennison describes the struggle between Low Country planters, Revolutionary republicans, black maroons, free people of color, and Native Americans to control the region. Georgia's violent and tumultuous first century culminated in the creation of a white man's republic. Readers of this excellent book will know that the outcome was neither uncontested nor inevitable."

Publisher, University Press of Kentucky, explains that Cultivating Race: The Expansion of Slavery in Georgia, 1750-1860 "explores the centrality of race in the development of Georgia, arguing that long-term structural and demographic changes account for this transformation. Jennison traces the rise of rice cultivation and the plantation complex in low country Georgia in the mid-eighteenth century and charts the spread of slavery into the up country in the decades that followed. Cultivating Race examines the “cultivation” of race on two levels: race as a concept and reality that was created, and race as a distinct social order that emerged because of the specifics of crop cultivation. Using a variety of primary documents including newspapers, diaries, correspondence, and plantation records, Jennison offers an in-depth examination of the evolution of racism and racial ideology in the lower South."

Clarence John Laughlin: An Artist with a Camera


The Documentary Channel says the film Clarence John Laughlin: An Artist with a Camera "chronicles the life of one of America's most significant and enigmatic visual artists. A philosopher, architectural preservationist and an early surrealist, his photography and writing documented the cultural and spiritual landscape of 20th Century America."

It also explains that "Laughlin was an irascible character, an under recognized artist, and an artistic genius. He struggled against the prejudice that was directed toward Southern artists of his day, and was ostracized for using techniques that were not readily accepted by the dominating photographic hierarchy. His legacy is a remarkable body of work that is a testament to an artist who relentlessly drove himself to achieve his dreams. Today, his 17,000 master prints are considered to be one of the most important archives in American photography."

Associate Professor/Director of Graduate Studies Michael Frierson, from the Department of Media Studies, was one of the directors and producers of this film. Jackson Library has both an instructional DVD copy and one that is available to be checked out.  More information about the film can be found at the website for Michael Murphy Productions Inc.

Friday, April 13, 2012

Optimizing Information Security and Advancing Privacy Assurance



According to the publisher, "Optimizing Information Security and Advancing Privacy Assurance: New Technologies reviews issues and trends in security and privacy at an individual user level, as well as within global enterprises. Enforcement of existing security technologies, factors driving their use, and goals for ensuring the continued security of information systems are discussed in this multidisciplinary collection of research, with the primary aim being the continuation and promotion of methods and theories in this far-reaching discipline."

Associate Professor Hamid R. Nemati is a member of The University of North Carolina at Greensboro Department of Information Systems and Operations Management and editor of Optimizing Information Security and Advancing Privacy Assurance: New Technologies. Both a print and an e-book version of this book can be found at Jackson Library. Dr. Nemati is also the Editor-in-Chief of International Journal of Information Security and Privacy and of the Advances in Information Security and Privacy (AISP) Book Series.

Writing Combat and the Self in Early Modern English Literature


Jackson library has Writing Combat and the Self in Early Modern English Literature: The Pen and the Sword available in both print and as an e-book. According to her website, author Jennifer Feather's, an assistant professor in the Department of English at UNCG, "scholarly and pedagogical interests include theories of violence and trauma, theories of embodiment, gender, and sexuality, fifteenth- and sixteenth-century British historical writing, interdisciplinary and historical approaches to literature, and early modern anatomies."

When describing Dr. Feather's book, Palgrave Publishing explains, "By examining competing depictions of combat in sixteenth-century texts such as Arthurian romance and early modern medical texts, this original study reveals both the importance of combat in understanding the humanist subject and the contours of the previously neglected pre-modern subject."

When reviewing Writing Combat and the Self in Early Modern English Literature: The Pen and the Sword, Patricia Cahill, associate professor of English, Emory University said, "Feather's compelling book considers the centrality of armed combat and physical suffering to English Renaissance literature. Arguing that medieval understandings of corporeality and combat functioned as crucial materials for English self-definition, she offers bold readings of texts drawn from a wide array of genres, including drama, poetry, romance, epic, and chronicle history. An impressive and theoretically sophisticated work."

Cradle to Cradle Home Design: Process and Experience


Associate Professor Anna Marshall-Baker who is also the department chair and undergraduate coordinator in the The Department of Interior Architecture at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Dr. Marshall-Bakerwho is one of the authors of Cradle to Cradle Home Design: Process and Experience. The publisher's website explains that this resource features:

• Discussion that differentiates c2c principles and competition information
• Sample projects related to chapter subject for users to develop a c2c project for their portfolios, supported with images from the various competition entries in addition to any derived from the exercises
• Interviews with practicing designers to provide insight into their experiences regarding sustainable design and informed design decisions
• Key terms featured in each chapter
• End-of-chapter exercises that demonstrate stages in the design process related to the chapter for students to apply the c2c principles
• Current website links to provide emerging information

The Fairchild Books goes on to say:

"Residential design that is inspired, responsible, and in harmony with the planet: that is the concept behind cradle-to-cradle systems, which seek to go beyond sustainability to the use of waste-free products that return to the earth's lifecycles. Cradle to Cradle Home Design: Process and Experience is a groundbreaking text that offers a case study in this revolutionary design concept via the Cradle to Cradle (C2C) Home Competition, based out of Roanoke, Virginia. More than 600 submissions from students and professionals around the world provide the archive for the book, creating a spirited, smart, and engaging guide that both delights in the possibilities offered by the paradigm, and inspires an alternative approach to design. Developed for interior design and architecture studio courses as well as practicing design firms, this book is a must-read for anybody looking to incorporate sustainable design principles and materials into his or her work."

You can find two copies of this work in Jackson Library.

Thursday, April 12, 2012

Library Technology and User Services: Planning, Integration, and Usability Engineering


Assistant Professor Anthony Chow in the Department of Library and Information Studies and Assistant Dean of University Libraries, and Head of Electronic Resources and Information Technologies Tim Bucknall wrote Library Technology and User Services: Planning, Integration, and Usability Engineering. Chandos Publishing explains that the book is:

"Written for all types of library settings, this guide focuses on library technology and automation within the larger context of strategic and systems planning, implementation, and continuous improvement. Technology is an essential resource for attaining both organizational and patron goals, and planning needs to emphasize the alignment between the clearly defined goals of each in an efficient and cost-effective manner. By providing an overarching theoretical and application framework for technology integration that emphasizes usability, this book will help readers understand both the why and the how of library technology, planning, and implementation."

Contents of  Library Technology and User Services: Planning, Integration, and Usability Engineering include:

  • Stone tablets, paper and the Internet: the same old library?
  • Strategic planning, organizational goals and technology: what and for whom? 
  • Customized fashion: finding the right fit
  • Technology and budgeting
  • Evaluation: is technology meeting the needs of the organization’s users?
  • Emerging technology trends in libraries




Reading and Writing Genre with Purpose in K-8 Classrooms


When reviewing Reading and Writing Genre with Purpose in K-8 Classrooms Laura Robb, author of Teaching Middle School Writers: What Every English Teacher Needs to Know, tells educators to "Make room on your professional bookshelf for a much needed book! You'll learn how to explicitly teach genre features and coach students as you establish meaningful writing purposes that inspire students to read. Not only do the authors provide solid guidelines for teaching genre in writing and reading, but they also invite you into classrooms to see how teachers and students create environments that engage all learners. And for each genre, you'll find lists of books to teach reading and writing!"

The publisher's description of Reading and Writing Genre with Purpose in K-8 Classrooms says:

"Drawing from theory and research that suggests students learn better and more deeply when learning is contextualized and genuinely motivated, the book presents five guiding principles for teaching genre. Emphasizing purposeful communication, it will guide you through teaching students to read, write, speak, and listen to different real-world genres that inspire and engage them. Nell Duke, Samantha Caughlan, Mary Juzwik, and Nicole Martin:

  •  identify commonly used assignments and practices for teaching genre that are fundamentally flawed and explain why
  • offer inspiring alternative practices, grounded in research and illustrated in real projects in real classrooms
  • show how the five guiding principles come to life in reading and writing projects across the whole K–8 grade span
  • provide planning sheets and other tools and tips that will allow you to manage genre-with-purpose instruction in your classroom.
This book is about teaching genre differently—with purpose. Reading and Writing Genre with Purpose in K–8 Classrooms will help you reinvigorate your teaching."

One of the authors, Assistant Professor Nicole M. Martin, is part of UNCG's Department of Teacher Education and Higher Education.

Black Vanguards and Black Gangsters


Steven R. Cureton is an associate professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. According to the publisher, Dr. Cureton's book "examines the extent to which black gangsterism is a product of civil rights gains, community transition, black flight, social activism, and failed grassroots social movement groups. Unfortunately, the voice of the ghetto was politically tempered, silenced, ignored, and at times rebuked by a black leadership that seemed to be preoccupied with a middle-class integrationist agenda. As a result, a once strong sense of universal brotherhood became fractured and the mood of the oppressed shifted to confusion only to be tempered by relentless frustration, out of which emerged black gangs."

Selected chapters include: 8. To Overcome or Be Over-run: Civil Rights Movement and Black Power, --14. The Emergent Gangsterism Perspective: Manhood Is Essential as the Air I Breathe, and --16. Gangs By Any Other Name: Omega Fraternalism and Hoover Gangsterism.

The University Libraries has Black Vanguards and Black Gangsters: From Seeds of Discontent to a Declaration of War in both print and as an e-book.

But Don't Call Me White


Assistant Professor Silvia C. Bettez's is part of UNCG's Department of Educational Leadership and Cultural Foundations. Her website explains that Dr. Bettez's "dissertation research project explores the life stories of sixteen adult mixed race women who have one white parent and one parent who is a person of color." She further explores this topic in the book But Don't Call Me White: Mixed Race Women Exposing Nuances of Privilege and Oppression Politics.

The publisher's website states "Silvia Bettez exposes hidden nuances of privilege and oppression related to multiple positionalites associated with race, class, gender and sexuality. These women are “secret agent insiders” to cultural Whiteness who provide unique insights and perspectives that emerge through their mixed race lenses.  Much of what the participants share is never revealed in mixed – White/of color – company.  Although critical of racial power politics and hierarchies, these women were invested in cross-cultural connections and revealed key insights that can aid all in understanding how to better communicate across lines of cultural difference."

The library has this work available both as a print book and as an e-book.

Monday, April 9, 2012

George Herbert's Travels: International Print and Cultural Legacies


Dr. Christopher Hodgkins from UNCG's Department of English edited George Herbert's Travels: International Print and Cultural Legacies. The publisher's website explains that "The essays in this collection feature many of the world’s leading Herbert scholars and are drawn from the more than fifty papers and plenary presentations delivered at the George Herbert’s Travels conference held at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in October 2008. They track Herbert’s “heart in pilgrimage” through four centuries of time, through west and east across space, through the inner spaces of the suffering body and soul, and through modernity into the postmodern. These essays ask how travel through space and time influences the reception and creation of literary art; in other words, how the movement of poetry affects and effects poetic movements. The interdisciplinary contributors observe Herbert’s poetry traveling geographically (from earlier British receptions, to the “American strand,” to the Far East), traveling internally (through the interior terrain of formal and bodily experience), and traveling temporally (through the shifting cultural landscapes made by Modern and Postmodern minds). Along the way, they discover connections between Herbert and a kaleidoscopic range of writers and thinkers including Augustine, William Shakespeare, John Donne, Edward Herbert, Anne Clifford, Robert Herrick, Henry Vaughan, Christopher Harvey, Thomas Traherne, Emily Dickinson, Gerard Manley Hopkins, W. B. Yeats, T. S. Eliot, Elizabeth Bishop, Anne Ridler, R. S. Thomas, Simone Weil, Robert Lowell, James Merrill, Philip Larkin, Harold Bloom, Anthony Hecht, John Bradburne, Seamus Heaney, Dallas Wiebe, Carole Rumens, and Vikram Seth."

Dr. Hodgkins is the Director of UNCG's Atlantic World Research Network and also directs the George Herbert's Living Legacies conferences.

Thursday, April 5, 2012

The Economics of Evaluation in Public Programs


Edward Elgar Publishing describes The Economics of Evaluation in Public Programs by explaining "This research collection illustrates the wide range of methodologies and methods available for the evaluation of public programs. All these methods address the benefits of the programs and most compare the benefits to costs, but the types of benefits and their measures vary greatly across the studies and across the different types of public programs. The key articles presented here explore these different approaches and offer many examples of actual evaluations of public programs across different public policy settings."

The editor asserts that Professor Albert N. Link, from the University of North Carolina, Greensboro's Department of Economics, and his co-author "provided an authoritative original introduction, which elucidates this diversity of approaches and settings and challenges scholars to contemplate an evaluation in terms of its theoretical foundation."


Professor Link also edited Valuing an Entrepreneurial Enterprise which is available from Jackson Library both in print and as an e-book. The publisher says "The core of the book presents the new methodology and demonstrates how it avoids the pitfalls of past approaches."


He also authored  Employment Growth from Public Support of Innovation in Small Firms which, according to the publisher, provides "a statistical assessment of the employment growth associated with public support of R&D in small, entrepreneurial firms through the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program."

Monday, March 26, 2012

Women's Power in Late Medieval Romance


Amy Vines, assistant professor in UNCG's English Department, wrote Women's Power in Late Medieval Romance. The publisher explains:

"The cultural and social power of women in the middle ages is perhaps hard to trace, with evidence for it scarce. This book argues that medieval romances provide a central, but under-explored, source for and examples of such authority. By reassessing the influence exerted by female characters, in a spectrum that includes both intellectual and chivalric aid and, in some cases, patronage, it considers how they functioned as models of cultural, intellectual, and social authority in medieval literary texts. In addition to examples set by the family connections, socio-political networks, and textual communities in which they lived, this study argues that women also learned methods of influence from the books they read. In texts like Troilus and Criseyde and Partonope of Blois, the female reader encounters an explicit demonstration of how a woman`s intellectual and financial resources can be used. The literary representations of women`s cultural power expose a continuum of influence from non-material effects to material sway in the medieval patronage system, an influence often unacknowledged in strictly historical and extra-literary sources."

Women's Power in Late Medieval Romance includes chapters such as: 1. Prophecy as Social Influence: Cassandra, Anne Neville, and the Corpus Christi Manuscript of Troilus and Criseyde -- 2. The Science of Female Power in John Metham's Amoryus and Cleopes -- 3. A Woman's "Crafte": Sexual and Chivalric Patronage in Partonope of Blois -- 4. Creative Revisions: Competing Figures of the Patroness in Thomas Chestre's Sir Launfal.

Developing Critical Cultural Competence: A Guide for 21st-Century Educators


Associate Professor Jewel Cooper, Assistant Professor Ye He, and Professor and Assistant Department Chair Barbara B. Levin, each a faculty member of the Department of Teacher Education and Higher Education at UNCG, wrote the book Developing Critical Cultural Competence.  Denise Carlson, Curriculum Consultant Heartland Area Education Agency, Johnston, IA said “As I read this book, it became clear that my long-held belief about the meaning of cultural competence needed a makeover. I am now convinced that my personal definition of diversity should embrace a much deeper appreciation of differences and transformative action.”

The publisher's website provides information about the content of the book:

"Cultural competence is key to improved student achievement
The increasingly diverse nature of today’s schools and the need to increase the achievement of all students, no matter their background, requires 21st-century teachers to develop critical cultural competence. Looking at data is not enough. We have to know who our students are! This book shows you how to provide professional development that deepens teachers' cultural understanding. Developing Critical Cultural Competence helps educators translate new knowledge into action with activities that focus on the three inseparable insights required for developing teachers’ critical cultural competency:
  • Understanding themselves
  • Understanding their students
  • Understanding their students’ families and communities
In addition to the activities are reflection questions, group discussion questions, online extensions for facilitators, and a sample professional development plan. A companion website provides reproducible resource lists and handouts as well as examples that can serve as models for some of the activities."



Thursday, March 22, 2012

Letting Go? Sharing Historical Authority in a User-Generated World

 
David Carr, author of Open Conversations: Public Learning in Libraries and Museums says “Technically, historical authority has always been shared with the public, but the expert public voice has not always been able to break through the practiced illusions of monumental scholarship and hallowed history. The marvelous and inspiring examples in Letting Go? will shape the aspirations of the future history museum as its practice leaders readjust their grip on ideas of authority. It will also guide institutions as they fulfill the next steps after letting go: reaching out, embracing lives, and reflecting, in the presence of the past and each other, on the complex beauties of our culture. This is a book about becoming something together, our most important process as human beings.”

The Pew Center for Arts and Heritage explains "Letting Go? investigates path-breaking public history practices at a time when the traditional expertise of museums and historical institutions is constantly challenged by evolving trends in technology, community-based programming, oral histories, and contemporary art. The anthology features 26 newly commissioned thought pieces, case studies, conversations, and artworks by 19 leading cultural practitioners...Drawing on examples from history, art, and science museums, Letting Go? offers concrete examples of “shared” authority between institutions and audiences, as well as models for innovative integration of public curation and participation."

One of the editors of Letting Go? is Director of Public History/Associate Professor Benjamin Filene. Dr. Filene is part of UNCG's Department of History.

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Words Their Way: Word Study for Phonics, Vocabulary, and Spelling Instruction




The publisher says "The developmentally driven Words Their Way instructional approach is a phenomenon in word study, providing a practical way to study words with students. The keys to this successful, research-based approach are to know your students’ literacy progress, organize for instruction, and implement word study."

Associate Professor in UNCG's Department of Teacher Education and Higher Education, Dr. Francine Johnston is one of the authors of Words Their Way. The publisher explains that 5th edition of this book has been updated with some of the features seen below.  

  • Ground-breaking online PDToolkit for Words Their Way™ gives educators access to:
      • all new how-to classroom videos
      • interactive classroom assessment tool featuring new user-friendly navigation
      • prepared and create-your-own word sorts
      • games, templates, and more!
    • Complimentary 6-month access packaged with each new Fifth Edition
    • To learn more, please visit: http://pdtoolkit.pearson.com
  • Innovative redesign of the book introduces technology integration aligning text to online videos, sorts, and assessments specific to each chapter.
  • Unprecedented inclusion of progress monitoring throughout the book.
  • Brand-new continuum of support model offers tips for better planning and carrying out word study lessons in the classroom.
  • Expanded discussion on oral vocabulary, secondary instruction, writing, and early/middle/late phases in the derivational relations stage.
  • Updated collection of classroom activities helps build the skills students need to move on to the next developmental stage.
  • New “Resources for Implementing Word Study in Your Classroom” provides information about resources teachers can use in their instruction.
  • Enhanced coverage of English learners provides tips and strategies for modifying instruction.
  • Classroom-ready appendices contain all the assessment instruments described in Chapter 2 as well as word sorts, sound boards, and game templates to get instruction underway.

Friday, March 16, 2012

Critical Issues in Peace and Conflict Studies : Theory, Practice, and Pedagogy




Dr. Thomas Matyók, who is currently an assistant professor in the Conflict and Peace Studies program at UNCG,  is one of the editors of the book Critical Issues in Peace and Conflict Studies: Theory, Practice, and Pedagogy. The publisher’s website explains that the field of  Peace and Conflict Studies (PCS) is one that “includes scholars and practitioners throughout the world working in peace studies, conflict analysis and resolution, conflict management, appropriate dispute resolution, and peace and justice studies. They come to the PCS field with a diversity of ideas, approaches, disciplinary roots, and topic areas, which speaks to the complexity, breadth, and depth needed to apply and take account of conflict dynamics and the goal of peace.” They go on to explain that “Critical Issues in Peace and Conflict Studies: Theory, Practice, and Pedagogy...is a collection of essays that explores a number of these issues, providing a means by which academics, students, and practitioners can develop various methods to confront the complexity of contemporary conflicts.

Critical Issues in Peace and Conflict Studies discusses the emerging field of PCS, and suggests a framework for the future development of the field and the education of its practitioners and academics. The book has a wide audience targeting students at the undergraduate, graduate, and post-graduate levels. It also extends to those working in and leading community conflict resolution efforts as well as humanitarian aid workers.” 
Two of Dr. Matyók’s colleagues, Dr. Sherril Hayes, also an assistant professor in Conflict and Peace Studies at UNCG, and Dr. Peter Kellett, an associate professor in the Department of Communication Studies at UNCG, also contributed to the book. Jackson Library has both a print and electronic copy of this work.

Friday, February 24, 2012

Afro-Eccentricity: Beyond the Standard Narrative of Black Religion


Choice, in its review of Afro-Eccentricity: Beyond the Standard Narrative of Black Religion, declared, "Hart (UNC Greensboro) has made a major contribution to the theoretical literature of black religion."

As Professor William D. Hart, Head of the Department of Religious Studies, describes, "In this text, I explore the Standard Narrative of Black Religion and under the term"Afro-Eccentricity," critical revisions and alternatives" (2). The publisher's website notes that "Hart explores four distinctive contributions to the discourse of Black Religion against the counterpoint of the Standard Narrative of Black Religion as the 'Black Church.' Three overlapping versions of the Standard Narrative - Souls, Church, and Ancestor - dominate scholarly and popular accounts of Black Religion."

Hart focuses on four figures, Charles H. Long, William R. Jones, Cornel West, and Theophus Smith, who, the publisher's site continues, "variously revise, circumvent, or otherwise break free of the confines of the Standard Narrative, thus providing a richer and less church-bound account of Black Religion. Though affirming their Afro-Eccentricity, Hart does not hesitate in raising questions about their work through narrative and discourse analysis."

While as of this writing (February 29, 2012), the print version of Afro-Eceentricity was checked out, the book is also available in electronic format from the University Libraries

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Three books from Professor James Fisher





















Head of the Theatre Department Professor James Fisher has recently published three books on the history of American theater. Historical Dictionary of Contemporary American Theater, is part of the Historical Dictionaries of Literature and Art series by Scarecrow Press. In the words of one review: "This two-volume set highlights the prominent people, movements, events, and organizations that shaped American theater from 1930 to 2010. Fisher offers a well-executed introductory essay that references
the cultural changes that influenced the theatrical experiences of the period. Supplementing the essay is a chronology featuring detailed impacts of events on theater year by year. . . . This is an excellent resource for theater practitioners and for scholarly researchers" (Choice).


Professor Fisher also recently edited a collection of essays, To Have or Have Not: Essays on Commerce and Capitalism in Modernist Theatre. As he writes in the book's introduction, "This eclectic collection spans dramatic works written during and about the Industrial Revolution and the rise of capitalism, Karl Marx’s theories, Wall Street, immigration, the Gilded and Jazz Ages, the two world wars, the Great Depression, the post-World War II economic 'boom,' and the recent (2007-2011) economic crisis and contemporary cultural issues” (1). Professor Fisher contributed one of the book's essays, "'Money is Our God Here': The Comedy of Capital in Edward Bulwer-Lytton's Money and Philip Barry's Holiday." UNCG's Professor Christine Woodworth also wrote one chapter, "Back-Alleys to Basements: Narratives of Class and (Il)legal Abortion on the American Stage." The University Libraries' collection includes this book in both print and electronic formats.

For more information about Professor Fisher's recent publications, please see our blog post from one year ago!

Friday, January 27, 2012

Indian Angles and Anglophone Poetry in Colonial India















In 2011, Professor Mary Ellis Gibson, English and Women's and Gender Studies, published two companion books with Ohio University Press: Indian Angles: English Verse in Colonial India from Jones to Tagore and Anglophone Poetry in Colonial India, 1780-1913. Both works contribute greatly to the scholarship of literature in English in India during the long nineteenth century and serve to introduce this poetry to a wider audience.

From the publisher's website:

"In Indian Angles, Mary Ellis Gibson provides a new historical approach to Indian English literature. Gibson shows that poetry, not fiction, was the dominant literary genre of Indian writing in English until 1860 and that poetry written in colonial situations can tell us as much or even more about figuration, multilingual literacies, and histories of nationalism than novels can. Gibson recreates the historical webs of affiliation and resistance that were experienced by writers in colonial India—writers of British, Indian, and mixed ethnicities."

"Anglophone Poetry in Colonial India, 1780–1913: A Critical Anthology makes accessible for the first time the entire range of poems written in English on the subcontinent from their beginnings in 1780 to the watershed moment in 1913 when Rabindranath Tagore won the Nobel Prize in Literature. . . . With accurate and reliable texts, detailed notes on vocabulary, historical and cultural references, and biographical introductions to more than thirty poets, this collection will significantly reshape the understanding of English language literary culture in India. It allows scholars to experience the diversity of poetic forms created in this period and to understand the complex religious, cultural, political, and gendered divides that shaped them."