Sustainable. Resilient. Free.: The Future of Public Higher Education
John Warner is a writer, editor, speaker, teacher, and consultant. Since 2001, he’s held a series of teaching positions at four different institutions, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Virginia Tech, Clemson University and College of Charleston, where he currently holds the title of faculty affiliate. Warner writes the Just Visiting blog at Inside Higher Ed, where he has become a national voice on issues of faculty labor and writing pedagogy. He also writes a weekly column for the Chicago Tribune on books and reading as his alter ego, The Biblioracle. He lives in Charleston, South Carolina.
Why I Love Belt
I fell for Belt after reading their Chicago Neighborhood Guidebook, which revealed aspects of the city I thought I'd known, that I otherwise never would have discovered. Here was a publisher that spoke to the region and people I knew in ways that got beneath cliches and stereotypes, and had an unerring eye for underappreciated talent. I was hooked.
Recommended Titles
Midwest Futures and How to be Normal by Phil Christman. Two essay collections that are both closely observed at the individual level, while revealing larger common truths. One of my favorite working essayists.
The Last Children of Mill Creek by Vivian Gibson. A book that both renders Gibson's childhood in indelible detail, and connects that life to landscape of urban America today.
What You Are Getting Wrong About Appalachia by Elizabeth Catte. Billed as a corrective to that book by the Yale Law hillbilly grifter. Yes, indeed.
Rethinking Fandom by Craig Calcaterra. This is the book for those of us who love sports, but are increasingly bothered by the sports industry. Change is possible. It's actually already happening.
Where to Find Me
Find me on Twitter (@biblioracle), or my newsletter where I write weekly about book-related goings on, and will tell you what to read next if you tell me the last five books you've read: The Biblioracle Recommends.