Dr. Daniel J. Maloney
Marian College School of Education
FOnd du Lac, WI
"I have been carrying Goodbye Gutenberg
around in my backpack for almost a month now treasuring
its pages, playing with its ideas and being fascinated
by its gorgeous graphics.
Author, Valerie Kirschenbaum,
a New York City high school teacher has created
a truly original book in Goodbye
Gutenberg. Yet,
I am not sure it is titled correctly. Kirschenbaum
has followed her own unique path of inquiry into
the world of ideas, education, color, design,
technology and history. The book's title somehow
doesn't reach out and let the potential reader
know the remarkable journey of thought and imagination,
which the book invites.
Throughout the book, it
is astonishing to watch the many ah ha! moments
that Kirschenbaum clearly had on the path of inquiry
she instinctively trusted herself on in pursuing
the subject of the book.
Goodbye Gutenberg
is book on imagination, creativity, and the path
of intellect, research, design, color, change
and history. It is a book to be treasured over
time and to be explored in relation to one's own
thinking and ideas.
I believe Goodbye
Gutenberg has tremendous
potential as a Reader's Club book or as textbook
across a number of academic disciplines in higher
education. It is particularly suited to advanced
seminar where ideas are considered. The book and
its ideas can be a wonderful catalyst into any
subject as its fundamental premise is that in
order to learn new things, we must open our minds
and eyes and imaginations. From that open place,
new leaps of thought and conceptualization can
spring forth. Surely this is a book that one cannot
help but enjoy alone, yet it calls out to be shared
and discussed!
A final note of praise
for Kirschenbaum's Goodbye
Gutenberg is that
this gorgeously illustrated book full of ideas
and beautiful visuals has been priced at less
than $25.00. In a world of textbook prices gone
mad, this is a truly valuable buy. I don't think
anyone who uses this book will be re-selling it
at the end of term. For me at least, it's a book
that I love simply because it represents a doorway
to new thinking and new ideas. A work well worth
savoring over time.
Praise for Valerie Kirschenbaum and her very original
publication! <
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