CLJ Book & Media Review Editor
Jennifer deWinter
Worcester Polytechnic Institute
jdewinter@wpi.edu
We invite reviews of books and/or multimedia, along with book/ multimedia suggestions for review, that address any social, cultural, rhetorical, or institutional aspects of community literacy. We particularly invite media and book-review pieces collaboratively written by community literacy practitioners, graduate students, and faculty.
We invite you to submit reviews that you feel should be included in our budding conversation about literacy work that exists outside mainstream educational and work institutions. It can be found in institutionalized programs devoted to adult education or lifelong learning or work with marginalized populations, but it can also be found in more informal, ad hoc projects. One goal of the journal, and of the review section in particular, is to extend and expand beyond conventional book reviews to include more visual and digital representations.
By multimedia, we mean: digital film, documentaries, DVDs, websites, or other visual representations of communities where literacy issues may be represented, discussed, or displayed.
CLJ Book Review Guidelines:
- Include the title’s publication information: place and date of publication, and ISBN #
- Summarize the title’s argument for readers, putting it into some community-literacy context: where is the title situated in community-literacy practice, research, history, or scholarship?
- Note the title’s methodology and how that methodology can be understood in analytic, case-study, textual, narrative, linguistic, ethnographic, educational, research, or other representational contexts
- Discuss how the title aligns – or not – with historical or contemporary arguments about community literacy; the reviewer should not use this opportunity to engage in taking a position or staking out argumentative positions of her own, but, rather, putting the arguments into productive and generative contexts for readers
- Suggest who might benefit from reading the title: graduate students; parents; literacy workers; rhetoric and composition historians; administrators; filmmakers; legislators; writing-center staff; language scholars, etc.
- Point out possibilities and new conversations that might emerge from materials, perspectives, and possibilities not addressed in the title
Book and media review contributions should be 1000-1250 words in length, but longer submissions will be accepted for reviews that incorporate multiple titles. Format: MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, 7th ed.
To submit reviews, suggestions for reviews, or request further information, send a message to the Book & New Media Review Editor Jennifer deWinter, Eastern Washington University, at jdewinter@wpi.edu.
Read any good books recently? Watched an excellent documentary? Attended an art show? Do any of these experiences explore community literacy? If so, the Community Literacy Journal, which is edited and produced at DePaul University -- http://www.communityliteracy.org/ -- is soliciting reviews.
Here are some books that we have identified for review (just for some ideas):
▪ The Public Work of Rhetoric: Citizen-Scholars and Civic Engagement
▪ Cultural practices of literacy : case studies of language, literacy, social practice, and power by Victoria Purcell-Gates, 2008
▪ Urban Literacies: Critical Perspectives on Language, Learning, and Community
▪ Rhetorics for Community Action: Public Writing and Writing Publics
▪ Literacy in the Digital Age by R. W. Burniske (has a chapter on CL)
▪ Local Literacies: Reading and Writing in One Community by David Barton and Mary Hamilton
▪ City of Rhetoric: Revitalizing the Public Sphere in Metropolitan America
▪ Writing Community Change: Designing Technologies for Citizen Action
While this is not an exhaustive list, it provides a place to start. In the same way that literary practices occur in surprising places and times, so too does the literature break away from the typical boundaries of academic publications.
In addition to the traditional book review, I will be instituting a “Keywords” essay in the book review section. Currently, there is more literature available than we are able to review in a semi-annual publication. As such, we at the journal have decided to include a thematic synthesis essay organized under key themes in the field of community literacy. We have published bibliographic syntheses on “Adult Literacy,” “Ethnography,” and “Reciprocity.” We are always interested in more. These essays will serve the purpose of collecting the sources and putting them in conversation with one another in order to appreciate where we have been as a field of study and where we will go.
If you are interested in writing one of these essays, please contact me with the keyword that you would like to explore. These are about 7-9 pages long, and we have received praise for their use as an excellent starting place for research and inquiry.
Both the book reviews and synthesis essays are also excellent publication opportunities for graduate students.
Please feel free to email me at jdewinter@wpi.edu with questions, queries, and submissions.
ISSN: 1555-9734