Tadween Roundup: News and Analysis from the Publishing/Academic World

Tadween Publishing brings you the latest news and analysis from the publishing and academic worlds that relate to pedagogy and knowledge production. 

Education

The Americanization of British Higher Education
By Lucy Hodges (New York Times)  

An experiment with the American-style grading system in Great Britain draws criticism for being an inadequate tool for judging student performance.

Can Higher Education Really Save Our Humanity?
By James Poulos (The Daily Beast)

Amid a cacophony of criticism of higher education systems, James Poulos digs deeper and articulates how higher education is failing to interpret humanity. “We trace the university back to Plato’s academy for a reason,” writes Poulos, stating that “the philosophical investigation of our anthropological reality is the cornerstone of higher education.”

Adjuncts Gain Traction with Congressional Attention
By Audrey Williams June (The Chronicle of Higher Education)

Leader in the adjunct-advocacy group New Faculty Majority Maria C. Maisto grabs attention of the U.S. Congress in the plight to gain more interest in the misuse of adjunct faculty in higher education.

Blogging Deemed Beneath the Hallowed Halls of Academia
By Dara Kerr (CNET)

Is blogging unprofessional? A move by the International Studies Association that bans the editors of its journals from blogging sparks controversy and draws criticism for being against academic freedom.

Stop Citing Your Papers. Start Hyperlinking.
By Tyler Lopez (Slate)

With the digitization of so many academic resources should footnotes and formatting citations be thrown out in favor of in-text hyperlinking?

Down With Textbooks
By David Cutler (The Atlantic)

David Cutler argues that textbooks present a flawed and misconceived version of the past to history students.

.YourUniversityHere
By Carl Straumsheim (Inside Higher Ed)

New rules from the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers  (ICANN) which opens the doors for the creation of different domain names has drawn little traction from higher education institutions.

The 70-Year Wait for Primary School
By Sean Coughlan (BBC)

A new report by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco) finds that it will be 70 years before all children have access to primary school.


Publishing

LATin: South America’s Open Education Publishing Project
By Andrés Delgado Darnalt (Publishing Perspectives)

The LATin Project, run by university researchers from across Latin America, aims to improve access to digital textbooks produced in the region.

New Study Identifies Half-Life of Journal Articles
By Ian Chant (Library Journal)

A new study look into the lifespan of academic journal articles in order to evaluate how they are used by students, educators, and researchers.

Amazon’s Data and its Move to Take Over Academic Publishing
By Mercy Pilkington (Good E-Reader)

Mercy Pilkington writes about Amazon’s creeping attempt to dominate the publishing world in academia by becoming a main provider to universities and libraries.

How the ‘Netflix of Books’ Won Over the Publishing Industry
By Daniel Terdiman (CNET)

CNET interviews the CEO of Oyster, Eric Stromberg, about the book subscription service that allows you to rent a book in the same way you would rent a movie.

Get Ready for More Mergers and Acquisitions in Book Publishing
By Jeremy Greenfield (Forbes)

After a few shake-ups that rocked the book publishing world in 2013, Jeremy Greenfield predicts that more mergers and acquisitions are in store for the publishing industry in the near future.

Does Digital Publishing Mean the Death of the Author?
By Richard Lea (The Guardian)

“If all you're interested in is finding an audience for your work,” Richard Lea writes, “then electronic distribution allows you to find it without any connection to the marketplace at all.”