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They Learn, You Win

Here is a novel way to put together a dictionary of religious philosophy: make the book a class project. At St. Olaf College, professor Charles Talafierro challenged students in his Philosophy of Religion seminar

... to define difficult, often complex religious terms and concepts for a reference book and companion guide, which will be published by Scarecrow Press in 2010.

For the project, each of the participating students was assigned several religious term or historical figures. Their goal: to conclusively define each term in a single, short entry, often no longer than 12 to 15 sentences in length.

The students will receive credit for their work, along with other scholars involved in the project. All the entries are edited by Talafierro, who expects "the final product [to] be around 240 pages long, and contain roughly 300 definitions."

 

How the Web Is Changing Writing

Both fiction and academic writing are being transformed by the Web and the ubiquity of new technologies. From The New York Times:

Conspiring with a distant lover? Try texting. Lost in the woods/wilderness/Ionic Sea? Use GPS. Case of mistaken identity? Facebook!

Technology is rendering obsolete some classic narrative plot devices: missed connections, miscommunications, the inability to reach someone. 

The article laments the way that today's connectivity is constraining writers, and even considers how the Bible would have changed if devices such as cell phones had been available in Old Testament times.

Meanwhile, Cleveland's Plain Dealer reports,

Publishers are starting to leave out footnotes and photographs in scholarly books and urging researchers to supplement their texts by posting these on the Web. Academics are shifting their research topics to better suit the cyberspace environment.

Read more here.

Encyclopedia Is Too Christian?

The National Review reports,

Wiley-Blackwell, a major academic press, was set to release its four-volume Encyclopedia of Christian Civilization this month. According to the encyclopedia’s editor, George Thomas Kurian, the set had been copy-edited, fact-checked, proofread, publisher-approved, printed, bound, and formally launched (to high praise) at the recent American Academy of Religion/Society of Biblical Literature conference. But protests from a small group of scholars associated with the project have led the press to postpone publication, recall all copies already distributed, and destroy the existing print run. The scholars’ complaint? The Encyclopedia of Christian Civilization, they have reportedly argued, is “too Christian.” “They also object to historical references to the persecution and massacres of Christians by Muslims,” Kurian says, “but at the same time want references favorable to Islam.”

The Catholic News Agency adds,

The encyclopedia’s Editor-in-Chief is filing two lawsuits against the company to require the encyclopedia be published without removing its “Christian content, tone and character.”

George Thomas Kurian, Editor-in-Chief of the Encyclopedia of Christian Civilization (ECC), has circulated a letter protesting Blackwell’s actions, which he calls a “looming crisis” in the publication of the work.

The publisher's response?

Susan Spilka of Blackwell’s parent company John Wiley & Sons, Inc. responded to Kurian’s allegations in a statement, claiming that concern about the content of the ECC had been raised in November 2008 prior to publication. Blackwell stated that the review was prompted by concern for its “leading reputation as a publisher of high quality scholarly content.”

... It described as an allegation “completely without foundation” Kurian’s claim that the review is being driven by an “anti-Christian lobby determined to ‘de-Christianize’ and censor the Encyclopedia.”

The lawsuits, of course, are still to be settled.

Marketing and Design Tips for Scholarly Authors

Beyond the Book offers a podcast of an interview with Robert Christopherson, an award-winning author of geography textbooks, about the importance of author involvement in marketing and design of their books:

The idea that an author toils and produces a manuscript, and then some marketing people that know nothing about your subject are going to be in control of marketing it, to me, is ridiculous... I view the author as being someone deeply involved in the entire process.

Christopherson offers a number of tips for authors, from obtaining a business card to promote their book,  to reviewing design concepts and being sensitive to foreign markets. The interview is also available as a downloadable transcript.

USA: Challenges of Church Publishers

"From Gutenberg to Google: Church publishers face many challenges." That's the lead article of the November 2008 issue of The Lutheran magazine, discussing not just Lutheran, put also Baptist, Christian Reformed, Episcopalian, Methodist, and Presbyterian publishing. An excerpt:

 Look at the figures gathered by LifeWay Research in a March study done for the Protestant Church-owned Publishers Association: Unit sales for denominational publishers are down 3.5 percent from a year ago, 8 percent from five years ago and 41 percent from 10 years ago. Denominational magazines, such as The Lutheran, follow the same trend: 2.2 percent for one year, 11 percent for five, and 20 percent for 10.

The United Methodist News Daily Digest reports declining sales as well:

The United Methodist Publishing House reported a $3.2 million shortfall in sales for the first three months of the 2008 fiscal year, even though revenue for the fiscal year ending in July was above budget and expenses were down. The current economic climate has had a "detrimental impact" in the fiscal year beginning Aug. 1, said Neil Alexander, president and publisher.

USA: Custom Publishing for Religious Textbooks

Reporting on the American Academy of Religion meeting, Publisher's Weekly notes custom publishing of religious textbooks may be a new trend:

What looks like a book, provides revenue to publishers, and allows custom content for religion scholars in the college classroom? The answer is Professor's Choice, a custom publishing program from St. Mary's Press launched at AAR. Professor's Choice uses print on demand and licensed content from publishers to provide college and university religion teachers an opportunity to mix content chunks—book chapters, images, maps, glossaries—into a course book that can be shipped within 48 hours. Participating publishers are largely Catholic, but the evangelical Christian imprint IVP Academic is already on the roster, and St. Mary's is expecting to grow in religious variety quickly.

Ethics and Religion Curriculum in Québec

Cyberpresse.ca interviews the authors of a new ethics and religion curriculum published by Éditions Modulo, a school and university textbook publishing company, for use in primary schools. Lily Cloutier, one of the authors, describes the team's approach:

Our books propose a cultural approach to religion, where a child is taught to recognize the vocabulary and expressions of religion so as to better understand them. This is not a confessional approach; we do not tackle questions about the meaning of life or how to walk in faith.

Popsicle Sticks and Pipe Cleaners Old-Fashioned

The supplies required for Sunday school and Vacation Bible school curriculum have changed, says The Chattanooga Times Free Press. An article in the Palm Beach Post concurs. Instead of relying on paper plates, Popsicle sticks, and pipe cleaners, publishers now suggest a broader range of craft supplies, including recycled materials and plastics. How does your curriculum compare?

Curriculum and Technology: Standards for Educators

The International Society for Technology in Education, Microsoft, Cisco, Intel, and others partnered with UNESCO to develop Information and Communication Technology Competency Standards for Teachers, released in January and available in English, French, Arabic, Russian, Spanish, and Chinese. The standards are intended to assist educational policy makers and curriculum developers (publishers!) to help teachers to integrate technology in education. 

Spirituality Makes Children Happy

Researchers at the University of British Columbia (UBC) conducted a study measuring the factors that affect children's sense of happiness.

“Our goal was to see whether there’s a relation between spirituality and happiness,” [says  Mark Holder, Associate Professor of Psychology at UBC Okanagan, who conducted the study with graduate student Judi Wallace]. “We ... took multiple measures of spirituality and happiness in children.”

The results were a surprise – 6.5 to 16.5 per cent of children’s happiness can be accounted for by spirituality.

In contrast, prior research shows that spirituality typically accounts for four or five per cent of adults' happiness. "From our perspective, it’s a whopping big effect,” says Holder.

USA Today reports more research is sought "to see whether children score similar results in a country not dominated by Christianity." The findings were presented at the 2008 World Congress on Psychology and Spirituality in India in January, and

“People from Portugal, Australia and India are interested in our research and possibly trying to duplicate it in their own countries,” says Wallace.