In Improbable Scholars, David L. Kirp challenges the conventional wisdom about public schools and education reform in America through an in-depth look at Union City, New Jersey's high-performing urban school district. In this compelling study, Kirp reveals Union's city's revolutionary secret: running an exemplary school system doesn't demand heroics, just hard and steady work.
The #1 selling scholarship guide from winners of more than $100,000 in scholarships. A directory of more than 1.5 million scholarships, grants and prizes that you can use at any college, The Ultimate Scholarship Book includes helpful indexes to pinpoint the best scholarships for you.
"This book offers a short, spirited defense of rhetoric and the liberal arts as catalysts for precision, invention, and empathy in today's world. The author, a professor of Shakespeare studies at a liberal arts college and a parent of school-age children, argues that high-stakes testing and a culture of assessment have altered how and what students are taught, as courses across the arts, humanities, and sciences increasingly are set aside to make room for joyless, mechanical reading and math instruction. Students have been robbed of a complete education, their imaginations stunted by this myopic focus on bare literacy and numeracy. Education is about thinking, Newstok argues, rather than the mastery of a set of rigidly defined skills, and the seemingly rigid pedagogy of the English Renaissance produced some of the most compelling and influential examples of liberated thinking. Each of the fourteen chapters explores an essential element of Shakespeare's world and work, aligns it with the ideas of other thinkers and writers in modern times, and suggests opportunities for further reading. Chapters on craft, technology, attention, freedom, and related topics combine past and present ideas about education to build a case for the value of the past, the pleasure of thinking, and the limitations of modern educational practices and prejudices"--
In this groundbreaking book, Aldon D. Morris’s ambition is truly monumental: to help rewrite the history of sociology and to acknowledge the primacy of W. E. B. Du Bois’s work in the founding of the discipline. Calling into question the prevailing narrative of how sociology developed, Morris, a major scholar of social movements, probes the way in which the history of the discipline has traditionally given credit to Robert E. Park at the University of Chicago, who worked with the conservative black leader Booker T. Washington to render Du Bois invisible. Morris uncovers the seminal theoretical work of Du Bois in developing a “scientific” sociology through a variety of methodologies and examines how the leading scholars of the day disparaged and ignored Du Bois’s work. The Scholar Denied is based on extensive, rigorous primary source research; the book is the result of a decade of research, writing, and revision. In exposing the economic and political factors that marginalized the contributions of Du Bois and enabled Park and his colleagues to be recognized as the “fathers” of the discipline, Morris delivers a wholly new narrative of American intellectual and social history that places one of America’s key intellectuals, W. E. B. Du Bois, at its center. The Scholar Denied is a must-read for anyone interested in American history, racial inequality, and the academy. In challenging our understanding of the past, the book promises to engender debate and discussion.
A step-by-step guide to crafting a compelling scholarly book proposal—and seeing your book through to successful publication The scholarly book proposal may be academia’s most mysterious genre. You have to write one to get published, but most scholars receive no training on how to do so—and you may have never even seen a proposal before you’re expected to produce your own. The Book Proposal Book cuts through the mystery and guides prospective authors step by step through the process of crafting a compelling proposal and pitching it to university presses and other academic publishers. Laura Portwood-Stacer, an experienced developmental editor and publishing consultant for academic authors, shows how to select the right presses to target, identify audiences and competing titles, and write a project description that will grab the attention of editors—breaking the entire process into discrete, manageable tasks. The book features over fifty time-tested tips to make your proposal stand out; sample prospectuses, a letter of inquiry, and a response to reader reports from real authors; optional worksheets and checklists; answers to dozens of the most common questions about the scholarly publishing process; and much, much more. Whether you’re hoping to publish your first book or you’re a seasoned author with an unfinished proposal languishing on your hard drive, The Book Proposal Book provides honest, empathetic, and invaluable advice on how to overcome common sticking points and get your book published. It also shows why, far from being merely a hurdle to clear, a well-conceived proposal can help lead to an outstanding book.
Since 2001 William Germano's Getting It Published has helped thousands of scholars develop a compelling book proposal, find the right academic publisher, evaluate a contract, handle the review process, and, finally, emerge as published authors. But a lot has changed in the past seven years. With the publishing world both more competitive and mor...
The #1 selling scholarship guide from winners of more than $100,000 in scholarships. A directory of more than 1.5 million scholarships, grants and prizes that you can use at any college, The Ultimate Scholarship Book includes helpful indexes to pinpoint the best scholarships for you.
In these playful, erudite, and idiosyncratically personal essays from the Washington Post Book World, Michael Dirda shares some of the pleasures of the reading life. His subjects range from classics in translation to fantasy and crime fiction; from children's books to American and European literature; from innovative writing to neglected novels; from the dark joys of collecting first editions to the untroubled pleasure of P. G. Wodehouse. Dirda is a writer's reader and a reader's writer. He is a sure guide to good reading from the casual to the scholarly, and his columns are always diverting and informative, always worth coming back to. Readings presents many of his most memorable essays, including "The Crime of His Life" (a youthful caper), "Bookman's Saturday" (the scheming of a book collector), an annotated list of 100 comic novels, "Heian Holiday" (on The Tale of Genji), reflections on sex in literature, "Mr. Wright" (an exemplary high school teacher), "Listening to My Father," "Turning Fifty," and "Millennial Readings." In all these, and in 40 other pieces, Michael Dirda shows us books as sources of aesthetic bliss, comfort, and not least, amusement.
