Book Review

Claude Steele’s Whistling Vivaldi: And Other Clues to How Stereoptypes Affect Us

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Book page for Claude Steele, Whistling Vivaldi

Tonight in the faculty meeting at Phillips Academy, we will discuss Claude Steele’s Whistling Vivaldi.  It’s an exceptionally good book on many levels.  The social science is deep and revealing; the personal narratives are compelling; and the ideas for concrete action at schools are constructive. 

It seems fitting to be having this conversation tonight, on the 50th anniversary of James Meredith’s registration at Ole Miss.  Yesterday’s lead story in the New York Times (by Adam Liptak) also highlighted the important new challenge to affirmative action that the United States Supreme Court will hear this term.  (From the story: “On Oct. 10, the court will hear Fisher v. University of Texas, No. 11-345, a major challenge to affirmative action in higher education.”) It’s unfortunate that we are still struggling at the level of admissions of diverse communities; the discussion should be much further along than it is today.

The conversation about what schools should do once we have highly diverse communities is at the top of our access agenda.  It’s not enough to admit students from a broad range of backgrounds; it’s essential that we are intentional and effective about how we enable all students to succeed and enjoy their time at schools, including Andover.

NONOBJECT (or, I bought my first book in the form of an iPad app)

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I bought and downloaded my first book-as-iPad-app yesterday: NONOBJECT, by Branko Lukic and Barry M. Katz (MIT Press, 2010).  It cost $19.99 and one finds it in the Apps Store, not in the book store.  It took quite a while to download over my home connection.  It was worth it, both in terms of cost … Read more

Noah Feldman, Scorpions: The Battles and Triumphs of FDR's Great Supreme Court Justices

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I have had the great pleasure this evening of introducing Prof. Noah Feldman on the occasion of his talk on his new book, Scorpions: The Battles and Triumphs of FDR’s Great Supreme Court Justices (Twelve, 2010).  Noah’s interlocutor: our great friend Christopher Lydon, former Berkman Center fellow and journalist who has led the way in … Read more

Susan Rabiner, Thinking Like Your Editor

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As I’ve been gearing up to write a new book, I’ve been thinking about how to do it better this time — continuous improvement and all that.  Some fairly obvious observations are on my mind: stronger argument, a more compelling narrative, less repetitive, probably shorter, and one big-picture idea,* below the rest of the post. … Read more

Research Confidential and Surveying Bloggers

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In our research methods seminar this evening at the Berkman Center, we got into a spirited conversation about the challenges of surveying bloggers.  In this seminar, we’ve been working primarily from a text called Research Confidential, edited by Eszter Hargittai (who happens to be my co-teacher in this experimental class, taught concurrently, and by video-conference, … Read more

Dawn Nunziato's Virtual Freedom: Net Neutrality and Free Speech in the Internet Age

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Dawn Nunziato, a law prof at George Washington University Law School, has written a helpful and interesting new book, entitled Virtual Freedom: Net Neutrality and Free Speech in the Internet Age. Her focus in “Virtual Freedom” is — as the subtitle suggests — free speech on the net, framed primarily for the current net neutrality … Read more

Digital Youth Project Report, Book Released

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This week was a big one for the study of young people and the Internet: Mimi Ito and her team released the results of their long-anticipated, 3-year study on Digital Youth.  The study was funded by the MacArthur Foundation as a centerpiece of its Digital Media and Learning initiative.  It is required reading for anyone interested … Read more

A Review-in-the-Making of Born Digital

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Andy Oram, editor at O’Reilly, has posted something quite extraordinary on the wiki for our book and associated research project.  It appears that he has read Born Digital and then posted his review on the wiki for comment before he posts it to the O’Reilly Media web site.  I hope others will take up his challenge to … Read more

Digital Media, Youth, and Credibility

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The final book in the MIT Press/MacArthur series on Digital Media and Learning (well, final only in terms of my getting around to writing up a review of it on this blog!) is “Digital Media, Youth, and Credibility,” edited by Miriam J. Metzger and Andrew J. Flanagin. It’s not last because it is the least … Read more