PRESIDENT'S CHOICE

“Composing Ourselves: The Little Theatre Movement and the American Audience”

Dorothy Chansky

In an era of giant shows gleaming from the bright lights of Broadway competing against the new medium of film, some artists rebelled against the commercial aspects of theatre in an effort to change it from an entertainment to a serious art form.

That rebellion would become known as the Little Theatre Movement, and leaders created the foundation for the way much of the art form is practiced today.

The book chronicles movement from 1912 to 1925, unlike many researchers who concentrate on the 1910s.

The 293-page book is published by Southern Illinois University Press.

“Redneck Riviera: Armadillos, Outlaws, and the Demise of an American Dream”

Dennis Covington

Redneck Riviera is the true account of the author’s attempt to claim his inheritance—two and a half acres of otherwise worthless Florida scrubland that his father bought 30 years before in a notorious land scam.

Following a forced early retirement from U.S. Steel, Covington’s father bought the land in 1965 in the River Ranch Acres real estate scam, then left it to his son at his death in 1988.

When the younger Covington went to claim his property, he ran into more than bumps on the backroads: primarily a band of redneck locals who have dubbed themselves “The Hunt Club.”

This group has fenced off the property and restricted access to outsiders, making their point with loaded weapons.

Covington focuses on attempts to actualize his father’s dream and claim what is rightfully his.

The 182-page book is published by Counterpoint.

“The Miskitu People of Awastara”

Philip A. Dennis

Based on two and a half years of field work, this book uses concepts from recent interpretive anthropology to portray life among this group of indigenous people of Nicaragua.

The Miskitu-speaking people live in the eastern areas of Nicaragua and Honduras and are one of the largest indigenous groups of non-Mayan people in Central America.

To give a sense of the humanity of a people he has grown to love, Dennis describes how family life, turtle fishing, health practices, Miskitu Christianity and storytelling play into the lives of Miskitus of Awastara—the village he studied.

The 312-page book is published by University of Texas Press.

“Research Methodology in Applied Economics”

Don Ethridge

Want to know how to study economics?

This graduate-level textbook addresses designing, planning and conducting research in economics assuming that students understand the theory and techniques necessary to conduct economic research.

The 248-page book is published by Blackwell Publishing.

“Event-Structure and Internally-Headed Relative Clause Construction in Korean and Japanese”

Min-Joo Kim

This dissertation investigates how formal principles of grammar interact with pragmatic factors to produce what is called internally headed relative clause construction in Korean and Japanese.

This book can be a good read for anyone interested in linguistics and philosophy of language in general, or those interested in Japanese and Korean.

The 316-page book is published by Book Surge.

“Grace from China”

Jacqueline Kolosov

This novel for young adults tells the story of Jess, a 14-year-old girl who is still grieving over her father’s death in a car accident.

Suddenly, boy troubles, bad hair and friends with divorced parents don’t seem as important as she deals with her loss.

Jess learns that her mother still plans to adopt a daughter from China – something her parents had planned before her father’s death – and finds she no longer cares to gain a new sister.

Torn between her grief and supporting her mother’s desire to adopt the child, Jess eventually relents and travels with seven other families on their way to adopt their own Chinese daughters.

The 185-page book is published by Yeong & Yeong Book Company.

“Selected Topics in Animal Behavior. Section II: Behavioral Ecology and Social Behavior”

Gad Perry

This standard text for the Open University of Israel is designed for distance learners and is written in Hebrew. It covers three broad topics in behavioral ecology: reproduction and mate choice, foraging behavior and social behavior.

Perry’s expertise in behavioral ecology is enhanced by his knowledge and extensive travels to a variety of locations worldwide. He has done extensive research in Costa Rica, Israel, Guam and the British Virgin Islands.

The 272-page book is published by The Open University of Israel.

“Poems”

John Poch

This collection features formal, lyric poems written in traditional and experimental fashion.

This is Poch’s first book and is reminiscent of poetry from the past and reverence of the poetic masters.

The 63-page book is published by Orchises Press.

“El español del noroeste de Luisiana: Pervivencia de un dialecto amenazado (Spanish in Northwestern Louisiana: Survival of a Threatened Dialect)”

Comfort Pratt

The book looks at the history and language of the Adaesenos, a group of Hispanic colonists who settled around Natchitoches, La.

The book offers a unique perspective on language maintenance and language shift in the United States and serves as a valuable asset to students and linguists interested in the ramifications of language contact.

The 249-page book is published by Verbum and is written in Spanish.

“Framing ADHD Children—A Critical Examination of the History, Discourse and Everyday Experience of Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder”

Adam Rafalovich

Through intensive interviews with teachers, parents, clinicians and children suffering from ADHD, “Framing ADHD Children” exposes the often overlooked human experiences surrounding this behavior disorder.

Included are detailed historical discussions of ADHD, debates about the nature of the disorder, issues concerning children taking stimulant medications and the question of whether modern technology can detect ADHD in the brain.

This work illustrates how diagnosing ADHD is a complex social process requiring ongoing negotiation of uncertainty. The 196-page book is published by Lexington Books.

“Not Till We Are Lost: Poems”

William Wenthe

The poems in this book are arranged after the movement suggested by a passage in Thoreau’s “Walden.” This provides the book’s title and epigraph, which means not until we have lost the world do we begin to find ourselves and realize where we are and the infinite extent of our relations.

The lesson Wenthe writes in this collection focuses on losing life in order to gain life. He uses imagery such as abandoned downtowns or the dead body of a hawk or a dying redbud tree to show how fleeting life can be.

The 64-page book is published by Louisiana State University Press.

Story by John Davis; Photography by Neal Hinkle

James E. Brink