Colleges and Universities Books

This book has helped me design my international relations courses so that students are able to improve their writing, as well as it stimulates their interest in the topics at hand in new and innovative ways.

Nile C. Kinnick played halfback at the University of Iowa and won the Heisman Trophy in 1939. He was also senior class president, a brilliant economics student, and later, a WWII Navy pilot. Paul Baender has compiled Kinnick's diary and selected letters in the life of this extraordinary man.

The first half of the book contains letters of Kinnick from his college days onward up through his Navy service. Baender does his best to provide explanations and historical context either before or after each letter. The book's second half contains Kinnick's diary, followed by Baender's explanations at the end. My only complaint is that Baender would have provided some sort of conclusive end to the book.

It is fascinating to read such wonderful prose from Kinnick's letters and diary. College life and the game of football has certainly changed since 1939, but Kinnick's hopes, dreams and struggles are the same as we feel today. He was not perfect, but I find it remarkable that Kinnick, a country boy from Iowa born long ago, recognized racial inequality in his domestic travels.

Nile Clark Kinnick was killed in on a flight training mission during WWII, one of thousands of U.S. casualties. The act of reading this compilation of Kinnick's writings has helped me see the personal courage, honor, and integrity with which thousands of veterans have served, and has helped illustrate the weight of the struggle in which we were engaged. If you want to read about a great man, pick up this book.

This book is a superbly written history of one of the greatest leaders of the past century. You do not have to be a Notre Dame fan to appreciate the impact that Fr. Ted has had on our society and culture.

Do not be misled by the use of the word "flirtation" in this collection's title. It's a metaphor for flexibility and psychic and intellectual playfulness. In his Preface, the author asserts, "Flirtation keeps things in play, and by doing so lets us get to know them in different ways." Phillips, a British child analyst and respected literary critic, has assembled a series of readable, erudite, and sometimes thrilling essays on his customary favorite topics. They are fresh and insightful - as usual from him. He is interested in literature, contemporary and traditional psychoanalytic theory, attachment, depression, the uses and wonders of language, Lacanian musings and principles, and much more. The bibliography itself could form the backbone of a lengthy course of study. The collection is divided into several parts: "The Uses of the Past," "Psychoanalysis Revisited," and "Writing Outside," which includes literary essays on Philip Roth, Isaac Rosenberg, nineteenth century writer John Clare, and Hapsburg Empire-era Austrian Karl Kraus. But it his the essays on, or "flirting" with, a wide variety of psychoanalytic themes which are at the heart of this interesting, intelligent, and useful collection. "Freud and the Uses of Forgetting," "On Love," and "The Telling of Selves" reveal Phillips' ability to range widely - yet with focus, inherent compassion and kindness, and clarity - in the telling of his themes.

An essay on depression, in which he talks with great respect about the work of Lacanian analyst Julie Kristeva, is particularly interesting. Erich Fromm, Freud and his biographer, Jones, are also subjects of essays.

This is a terrific book, full of humane and productive thinking, and ought to be read and reread by anyone with an interest in the uses of psychoanalysis, and the very modern, creative, and original mind of Adam Phillips. Highly recommended.

When it comes to education, all parents strive for the very best for their children, but background and family differences as well as circumstances can alter those plans. For years, we as African American parents have experienced the sad educational outcomes that relates to our children not having the same advantages as many White American children. In the second printing of HIGHER GROUND, Leah Latimer provides Black parents with a guide that is intended to chart a successful course for their children from kindergarten to college.

Latimer has written an invaluable and resourceful handbook that will save many Black parents from years of anguish. She arms parents with the truth about our educational system and a definite plan of action aimed at guiding their children through high school, to college and how to pay for it all. She recommends beginning in kindergarten, but if your child is older, she shows you where to start at any age group. Her advice is prudent and very hard to ignore. She also uses advice from educators, students, professionals and parents to drive home all her points. Her dialogue is very lively and optimistic throughout. I was completely captivated by the information in this book and will definitely use the knowledge I've gained to start planning my child's educational future. The main thing I've learned is in this age of skyrocketing tuition costs, there is a way. This book is a must have for every Black parent.

Reviewed by Brenda M. Lisbon
of The RAWSISTAZ™ Reviewers

This is a philosophical challenge of learning from Derek Bok, the president of Harvard University. It is also a well-written scrutiny of the American system of higher education from the perspective of 1986.

(I should admit that the book is a sewed hardcover and manufactured with very high quality)

The author questions "the belief in knowledge for its own sake", and admires with the colleges where the faculties have formulated common goals and work collaboratively to achieve them. This concept is called "competency-based learning", where the students are primarily developing effective communication skills, improving analytic abilities, strengthening problem-solving capabilities. Competency-based learning is opposed to memorizing nomenclatural raw data that the students will soon forget if they won't use this data on day-to-day basis.

Throughout the book, the author emphasizes on the imperative of measurement of the quality of learning, and shows the difficulties of such measurements: how can it harm the education by orienting it too heavily to fit the measurements.

The author shows pros and cons of the American system compared with Italian, German, French and British systems. Admitting the lack of adequate means of measurement here as well, the author judges that the number of foreign students entering American universities may be a trustworthy mark to conclude that the American system is nevertheless the best. The author doesn't take into consideration that these foreign students may use American universities as an opportunity to enter the wealthy job market of the U.S.

Interestingly, in 1986, the computers were extremely expensive and did only start to invade the field of education. Nevertheless, the attitudes of the author towards computers were very optimistic. The author did envision that computers will revolutionarize learning, although he admits that "...technology has raised great hopes on several occasions in the past only to disappoint its backers. Thomas Edison once predicted that the phonograph would revolutionarize teaching, and, several prominent foundations and corporations spent large sums in a futile effort to bring radio and later television into widespread classroom use. In each case the new technology foundered because it cost too much, aroused the opposition of teachers, and failed to deliver the pedagogic gains that it enthusiasts had promised."

This history of Randolph-Macon Woman's College in Lynchburg, Virginia, is the work of professional educator and English professor Roberta D Cornelius. It is a carefully researched, well-documented review of RMWC from its inception through 1950. Obviously, RMWC has changed in the past 50 years, but it is fascinating to read how everything started, from the kernal of a dream, to the battles over developing its identity, to the history of the faculty, staff, and students.

There are some quaint touches we would not see in a current history, such as the use of a husband's name for a married allumna (e.g., Mrs. Ralph Whitesides), but for the most part this is an engaging history of a rigorous, evolving, and challenging program to be a major force in the education of the women of the South. It was interesting to read about the development of the international program, the debate club, and discussion of whether religious activities should be manditory or optional, and more.

Seems like it is time for the next 50 year historical review, especially given the current discussion about RMWC going coed.

How did the university survive so long? Why?

The answer is probably to be found in this series. Some of it is merely intersting trivia, other parts are truly fascinating. The role the university has played in society cannot be underestimated. The series provides an in-depth examination of what makes a university what it is historically.

Each of the chapters examines a different aspect of the university. Written by a group of wonderful scholars, the series is an excellent reference as well as a delightful read.

This is a must read for Razorback fans and a super read for football fans. Schroeder did an excellent job of covering the ups and downs of Razorback football. This book was so good that I have bought several for gifts! WOOOO PIG SOOIE!!!

I attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from September 1964 through June 1972; I worked at the MIT Lincoln Laboratories in the summers of 1968 and 1970. I was given this book by the MIT Alumni Association, and found it to be remarkable in its truthful rendition of events that I lived through, and things that came afterwards (going to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston in the 1990s), and seeing that Howard Johnson guided MIT through the late 1960s and beyond and the Museum of Fine Arts into a rebirth, and made it all look so easy. I look forward to the video that should accompany this!