Our Books - Ideas That Shape Scholarship

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In an era where digital transformation is reshaping education, this book is a vital guide for educators, researchers, and policymakers navigating technology integration into learning. It explores educational technology’s theoretical foundations and practical applications, emphasizing innovative strategies to enhance teaching and learning. From artificial intelligence and machine learning to blended learning models and virtual reality, the book provides actionable insights into leveraging cutting-edge tools effectively while addressing critical issues like the digital divide, ethical technology use, and equitable access. Positioned at the intersection of pedagogy and technology, the work draws on global case studies and frameworks such as TPACK to present adaptable solutions for diverse educational contexts. It is unique in its focus on foundational and emerging trends, and it supports educators in building digital competencies and fostering student-centered learning environments. Designed for classroom adoption, professional development, and research, this book is an indispensable resource for teacher educators, in-service teachers, policymakers, and educational researchers committed to transforming education for the digital age. Its blend of actionable strategies, ethical considerations, and future-focused discussions equips readers to embrace technology as a tool for innovation and inclusivity in teaching and learning.

For years, the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) has called for colleges and universities to implement high-impact practices (HIPs), or educational procedures that provide significant academic advantages to students. 'High Impact & Experiential Learning as Enhancing Quality on Campus' provides examples of such strategies from thirteen colleges and universities as they have been applied in the classroom and in service of each featured college and university’s mission statement and quality enhancement plan. Each institution included in this collection has committed to some such project or initiative (in some cases, the commitment goes back multiple decades), and each reflects the diversity of contemporary higher education in the United States. Public and private, small and large, selective and open access, religiously affiliated and non-sectarian, are all included here. The institutions provide a variety of creative examples of implementing experiential learning and the myriad HIPs as identified by the AAC&U, including: Capstone Courses and Projects, ePortfolios, First-Year Seminars and Experiences, Service Learning/Community-Based Learning and Undergraduate Research. Each chapter is framed around the project’s scope and significance, a clear expression of the purpose of the project, evidence of the institution’s commitment and capacity for the effort and how the project is aligned with stated goals and institutional priorities. Drawing from fields as broad as sociology, psychology, the humanities, and environmental sciences and studies, 'High Impact & Experiential Learning as Enhancing Quality on Campus' appeals to multiple classrooms and institutional goals. Given the expanded interest in experiential learning/HIPs in higher education over the past two decades, this first-of-its-kind collection offers a roadmap for faculty and administrators to implement the practices outlined in each chapter in service of students’ learning and their larger institutional goals.

This book is the second volume edited by Yvonne Bennett examining the lived religious lives of women in 21st-century Britain. The authors continue to explore contemporary women’s spirituality by looking at the way women use rituals and rites within their lives. Coming from different academic fields, the contributors bring together an interdisciplinary collection of voices on the topic of rituals and ritualistic behaviours. The chapters are woven together to shine a heterogeneous light on religion in the twenty-first century and the impact it has on women in Britain today. The volume also examines the editors’ own spirituality alongside that of the participants, offering a hybrid academic-practitioner viewpoint on ritual. The chapters begin and end with a philosophical examination of ritual and the manner in which ritualistic behaviours are incorporated into human experience. This book takes the reader on a journey from the cradle to the grave and from medieval history to the present day.

Latin America is a diverse mosaic of cultures that trace their origins back to Indigenous, African, Spanish, Portuguese and Islamic sources. Its philosophies, eloquently expressed by a long line of thinkers, are found not just in departments of philosophy, but also in its rich literature and art, which are given treatment in this volume. The Islamicate world is a unique, fourteen-century-old cultural mosaic that covers much of the known world. Despite its long civilizational experience, it too faces the challenge of emancipation from foreign domination and the chaotic cacophony of monologues afflicting our time. The papers collected here cover various aspects of the philosophies of these two constantly interacting traditions and how they impinge on an old problematic: “ghayriyya” (otherness) and “alienation”. Their themes include key figures like Ibn ʿArabī, Suhrawardī, Aḥmad b. Muṣṭafa al-ʿAlawī, Rudolfo Kusch, José Martí, Spain’s Moriscos, and contemporary Argentine philosophers; and expanding areas of research like the philosophy of the Nahua (popularly known as the “Aztec”) and the language reforms in Türkiye, both of which provide excellent examples of cultural self-alienation.

Through the presentation of various perspectives, this collection of essays addresses some of the intersections of race and communication. The topics addressed include, but are not limited to, how we communicate about race, what our race communicates to others, how we can do a better job of educating others on race-related issues, and how we can better define certain terms often utilized in conversations about race. The perspectives shared in this volume contribute much-needed depth to the discussion of the philosophical and practical considerations of race and communication, broadly.

Recent research has revealed a psychedelic inspiration for Nietzsche’s philosophy and, far from being a novelty in the history of philosophy, there is significant evidence that several of the first western philosophers ingested psychedelics as well. In his first book, Joseph I. Breidenstein Jr, PhD, maintained that western philosophy began as what we today would call a feminist religious reformation in the sense that many prominent presocratic philosophers were reviving a paleo/neolithic goddess-centered religiosity of rebirth within the largely patriarchal and death-glorifying culture of archaic Greece. And, in this book, Dr. Breidenstein Jr proposes that the presocratics’ psychedelic-reincarnationist-feminine model of education and/or worldview is better suited for democracy in the twenty-first century than the economic model of education that takes the west’s mainstream materialistic-secular worldview for granted. For several decades now, researchers have acknowledged both that the empirical evidence for reincarnation is overwhelming and that psychedelics can evoke past-life recollections, but ‘explanations’ for either reincarnation or how psychedelics do this have yet to be offered. By combining Nietzsche’s philosophy with the work of other thinkers, ‘Psychedelic Immortality’ both provides explanations for each of these phenomena and explores how situating education and democracy within the context of reincarnation can incite a renaissance of American culture and politics. For Nietzscheans and philosophers in particular, this book illustrates the contemporary relevance of two neglected aspects of Nietzsche scholarship—i.e. psychedelics and reincarnation—and, for researchers in such fields as feminist philosophy of religion, ecotheology, philosophy of education, social-political philosophy, and eastern philosophy, it offers a more plausible and healthier worldview in which to explore possibilities in their respective fields that are diminished by the mainstream paradigm. For spiritual seekers of all paths, it offers a conception of philosophy as a practice of awakening goddess consciousness that unfolds over the course of successive lifetimes.

'Uncovering Possible: Pedagogies for Apocalyptic Times' is an edited volume that holds our experiences as educators, activists, and community members navigating the global pandemic of the past several years. This pandemic is situated within the context of ongoing interconnected crises: oppressive systems, worsening climate, and economic urgency, all at an unsustainable pace. The work in this volume confronts the grief, loss, and injustice that apocalypse brings, while also engaging with the possibility and intentional, resilient joy necessary to build a better world. This volume is an invitation to explore both the impacts of this and many other apocalyptic events in learning spaces, as well as (re)imagine what’s essential to learning in community. Through research, storytelling, reflections from the field, poetry, and interactive activities, this volume shares lessons from those on the front lines of apocalyptic learning, inviting the reader to find their place in building the more equitable communities we need and deserve. This apocalypse is situated within a social context that extends beyond this single event. For many, apocalypse has, and continues to happen, through colonial white-supremacist capitalism. What we carry forward must include the collective knowledges capable of carrying us not just through this apocalypse but the apocalypses ahead.

This is a clear and concise and original investigation of God’s nature and existence. First of all, it considers (among other things) two of God’s traditional properties: being all-knowing and being all-powerful. It argues he cannot possess these properties. But, it argues this is in accord with him being worthy of worship. Secondly, it introduces the notion of evil being “overridden”. It argues he has to bring about other free living things and it is plausible they have to be liable to experience evil due to their conditions. But, it argues the evil in this world is “overridden”. Thirdly, it considers the principal arguments for the claim he does not exist. (They refer to the evil in the world.) It argues they do not establish sufficient grounds for this claim. Finally, it considers some well-known arguments for the claim he exists. It argues they face difficulties. It sets out other arguments: eg, some arguments to increase any degree of belief one has that God can exist. It includes a number of Appendices: Some remarks on God’s sovereignty; Are there sufficient grounds for the claim that, very probably, God does not exist?; Theodicy and some theodicies; Some further remarks on God and time; Some further remarks on a living thing which possesses the power to do this or that freely; Some remarks on God being simple; Some remarks on God being present in a spatial realm and God being present in a non-spatial realm; ... . It covers as a whole the principal parts of the Philosophy of Religion. It unifies these parts to a significant degree. It proceeds regularly by way of formal and clear arguments. It will be of interest to advanced students and specialists in Philosophy, Religious Studies, and Theology. Given its explanation of key terms, its jargon-free language, its clarity and brevity.... , it will be of interest to others, too.