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ISBN: 9780762771400
Author: Levin, Amelia.
from graphic novel guest blogger, Francisca Goldsmith:
The Empathy Muscle
Vance and Berger practice storytelling and visual art in a manner that brings immediacy to history and universality to distinctly detailed fictional characters. The influences of politics, economics and individual chance all have as much bearing on what we can and do make of ourselves as do our ambitions. Charles Dickens was the master of depicting this so that readers could experience empathy with the downtrodden, see behind their own prejudices about their social “betters” and come face to face with questions about how they themselves might have responded in situations such as those surrounding the hero Oliver Twist or such important, yet minor, characters as Miss Havisham. In Fred/Jim, we have not an Oliver Twist but a character as strong and as accessible, just as Gordon, Betty, and the others in Fred’s life have their own lives as well as influences on his.
American history curricula at the secondary school level rarely delve into the power politics of strikes and the criminal elements engaged in union busting during the Great Depression. Yet, teen readers will find that aspect of the action here as fascinating as the guaranteed gangster-thrills provided by the worst of the bad men, the empathy-leached Bill Sykeses who lurk in dark alleys and murder such semi-innocents as Fred’s girl friend. That Fred receives an education–clearly more that than indoctrination as political critics so often reduce it–in the theories of communism makes good sense in circumstances where we see the poverty of the period so vividly, but also have come to understand that our hero’s brain thirsts for theory to explain reality. That it is the Communists who provide for his prosthetic leg is perhaps heavy handed symbolism for sophisticated readers with a thorough understanding of political history, but teens may find this a perfect opportunity to experience the power of storytelling’s props to both carry the narrative and expose aspects of its underpinnngs.
Gordon’s story within the story is gracefully enclosed, an echoing demand that reader empathy replace the original antipathy his character rouses in both Fred and the reader. Like Dickens’ Fagin, rather than the flat evil Bill, his twisted personality is shown to be the result of efforts to cope with life’s imperfectly dealt hand.
What would I do? That is the question that provokes reader growth. Vance and Berger create a story so artful that the question refuses to fade long after Fred–and Gordon–have had their stories shown.
VANCE, James. On the Ropes. illus. by Dan E. Burr. 247p. Norton. Mar. 2013. Tr $24.95. ISBN 978-0-393-06220-5. LC 2012037353.
Adult/High School–Returning to expand on their excellent Kings in Disguise (Norton, 1988), Vance and Burr have created a meaty graphic novel that weaves adventure, politics, noir crime, and the Great Depression into a seamless and fully engaging whole. Teenaged Fred Bloch has taken to the road, more to fill his belly and active mind than to escape his youth. After adventuring as a hobo–and losing a part of his leg in a train accident–he is taken in and given both prosthetic medical care and an education by members of a Communist Party cell. Then, it’s off to join the circus, where Fred assists a bitter and alcoholic “magician” whose shtick is escaping a hangman’s noose and gibbet before cheering crowds. Both Fred and Gordon, the escapist, believe that they are keeping their personal secrets from each other. Fred’s includes his work for the Party, which entails regular instructions mailed to towns the circus will visit, addressing him as Jim Nolan. Union busters are hard on the mysterious Jim’s trail, and Fred himself longs for a life that allows him to follow his nascent writing career. Period style black-and-white comics tell important aspects of this story and its varied cast of characters. The era’s workers’ rights struggles, complicated as they were by party politics and gangsterism, spring to life as the story unfolds, but the evolution of Fred from hopeful boy to wiser young man satisfyingly remains at center stage.–Francisca Goldsmith, Infopeople Project, CA
I’ve been doing a lot of reading on responsive design lately (because my library is headed towards that), and that made me think. When designing websites, we tend to design for devices. That’s what responsive design is all about – it’s coding in such a way that your website “responds” appropriately to different screen sizes (i.e., desktops, tablets, smartphones). We design for things: for a desktop; for a screen; for a browser; for a tablet or smartphone.
Nothing wrong with that – a modern website has to work on all those devices, right?
But I also think we need to shift our focus a bit, to where it really counts. And that focus is not on the screen.
We need to design for people.
What’s that change?
We still need to do all the usual stuff – i.e., use great css, work on making our websites responsive, think about screensizes, readability, contrasting colors, etc.
But let’s also focus on people:
Simply put – put people first.
pic by Nicola Albertini
Related PostsZemantaThe White Plains Public Library is doing some amazing things with their teens (claymation, LEGO catapults, and more) with Teen Librarian Erik Carlson at the helm. Recently, they finished up a minute long PSA about distracted driving. I’ll turn it over to Erik for more:
This idea came from a film maker last year. He wanted to work with the library & the only money we had was from a grant from the Allstate Foundation. It was a large project where over a dozen teens worked on a PSA that lasted 5 minutes. We took that as a learning experience.
This year we found another local film maker named Mike LaVoie. I contacted the White Plains High School SADD chapter to see if they would like to work on the project. We had a smaller group…I think there were about 7 teens altogether. Mike put togethera no-budget script and explained it to the teens. I (Teen Librarian Erik Carlson) worked on locations, the library parking garage, a co-workers home & a local cemetery. Mike showed them some movie magic to make the car to appear to be moving, using fake smoke, lighting tricks. I came up with the eye drops for tears & one of the teens was able to talk a local medical supply store to loan us a wheelchair for the afternoon (this was a last minute thing).
You can check out the final cut of the PSA here: http://frontboxcreative.com/wplains
-Post by Justin Hoenke, Tame the Web Contributor
I have a new post up at the Center for Information Research and Innovation (CIRI) blog at the San Jose State University School of Library and Information Science:
http://slisapps.sjsu.edu/blogs/wp/ciri/2013/05/11/mooc-meets-learning-2-0-by-dr-michael-stephens/
Although educators and scholars are debating the advantages and downsides of MOOCs, with many asserting that MOOCs have the potential to provide new insight regarding online learning, research regarding MOOCs is in its infancy. A recent study by The Chronicle of Higher Education found that 79% of MOOC instructors believe MOOCs are “worth the hype” (Kolowich, 2013). John Daniel’s 2012 paper Making Sense of MOOCs: Musings in a Maze of Myth, Paradox and Possibility explores emerging issues that educators should consider and scholars should research: technology platforms, for-profit versus nonprofit models, effective pedagogy, and student success within large learning environments. A scan of recent research includes assessing the experiences of students and professors in MOOC environments, and evaluating various MOOC platforms and their impact on student learning. Clearly, evaluating MOOC environments is an area ripe for exploration.
The parallels between the MOOC movement and 23 Things/ Learning 2.0 programs, my research area for the past few years, are intriguing. Might we argue that Learning 2.0 (L2.0) programs, offered in hundreds if not thousands of organizations, are precursors to the evolving, open and large scale learning landscape we’re experiencing now?
Read the whole post at CIRI!
My new “Office Hours” column is up at Library Journal:
http://lj.libraryjournal.com/2013/05/opinion/michael-stephens/best-of-both-worlds-office-hours/
It’s a response to this letter last month in LJ by Krystal Taylor, an LIS student at IUPUI Indianapolis:
Something quite disturbing is happening to my LIS program…. As of next semester, the program is going almost exclusively to online courses. Due to low enrollment of our courses on campus, the school has decided to move online in an attempt to keep the program alive. I understand this need, but at what cost will this be to the library and information science field?
From the column:
Taylor writes, “Having taken both types of courses, I am convinced that face-to-face [F2F] courses are the better option.” I might argue the tide is turning on that sentiment. In 2011, I wrote “Online LIS Education or Not”on the choices between F2F and online programs. In just a few short months we’ve seen the announcement of a new online library management degree at the University of Southern California and now the evolution of the IU program to mostly online classes. Frankly, a brick-and-mortar LIS school without a fully online option may become a quaint reminder of days gone by in the next decade. With this shift comes a few important considerations for the various stakeholders: students, faculty, hiring librarians, and accrediting bodies.
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