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Teaching and Learning Resource (TLR)

1. Title

'Critical' Book Review

2. Keywords

Study skills; book review;critical thinking.

3. Introduction

Book reviews are to be found in most academic and professional journals, and in many specialist research newsletters etc. They are widely used - and written - by HE teachers and researchers, but are rarely written - and probably under-used - by most students. In addition to drawing students' attention to this rich source of information, the writing of a book review draws upon - and enables further development of - key academic skills, including those associated with 'active' (as opposed to 'passive') reading and with concise writing.

From a 'critical thinking' perspective, there is particular advantage in asking students to review books which fundamentally challenge their own thinking: it is for this main purpose that the TLR has been developed.

4. Aim

The principal aim of this TLR is to provide a framework within which students may exercise, and further develop, critical thinking skills.

5. Learning outcomes

Students who have engaged successfully with this TLR will:

• Have been challenged academically by examining ideas which are fundamentally opposed to their own.
• Have acquired a relatively detailed and critical understanding of one academic publication, along with the field of knowledge to which it relates.
• Have exercised and further developed the skills associated with 'active' reading.
• Have exercised and further developed the skills associated with clear and concise academic writing.
• Appreciate more fully the academic and educational significance of published book reviews.

6. Pre-requisites

Students should be broadly conversant with the subject area and academic context of the publication selected for review; whilst some prior knowledge of the divergent viewpoints which pertain to that field of enquiry would be helpful, the particular perspective adopted - and the manner in which it is presented - should not be so familiar as to invite an unthinking response.

7. How to use TLR

Specialist monographs and published collections are likely to be more appropriate items for review than introductory textbooks, student readers or technical documents. Where students are offered a choice of book to review, it may be helpful to establish a lower and upper page limit - both for the sake of consistency, and in order to exercise control over the scale of the task. In some cases, it may be appropriate to permit the review of a similarly-sized collection of related journal articles written by a single author or group of co-authors (whilst recognising that additional demands are made by such an exercise).

Book reviews can be a useful component of group project work (where each group member reviews a different publication of relevance to the project), but may also operate as a 'free standing' activity. They may contribute to the assessment of a 'study/research skills' or subject-specific unit/module; particularly in the latter case, where choice of relevant texts tends to be more limited, the issue of access to literature may need to be handled with care.

While this activity principally lends itself to independent study, tutorial guidance may assist in:

• guiding students' choice of publication (where this is not prescribed)
• ensuring that students are familiar with the conventions of book review writing, and with other general considerations
• enabling students to discuss their reading of the publication, in advance of delivering the completed review.

The development of critical thinking skills can be particularly fostered by judicious selection of review material - particularly where the selected book fundamentally challenges students' thinking on questions which are not easily or habitually exposed to scrutiny. For example, the following publications of the Institute of Economic Affairs (2 Lord North Street, London SW1P 3LB; Telephone 020 7799 3745; Internet http://www.iea.org.uk) advocate predominantly 'free market' responses to environmental questions, and take a characteristically sceptical view of 'mainstream' environmental claims-makers (whom they criticise for, inter alia, their poor science, their obsession with regulation, their unjustifiably apocalyptic predictions, and their ideologically-driven attempts to indoctrinate the public):

Aldrich-Moodie, Benjamin and Kwong, Jo (1997) Environmental Education (London: IEA)

Bate, Roger and Morris, Julian (1994) Global Warming: Apocalypse or Hot Air? (London: IEA)

Morris, Julian, ed (1997) Climate Change: Challenging the Conventional Wisdom (London: IEA)

North, Richard D (2000) Fur and Freedom: In Defence of the Fur Trade (London: IEA)

Pennington, Mark (1996) Conservation and the Countryside: By Quango or Market (London: IEA)

Rabkin, Jeremy and Sheehan, James (1999) Global Greens, Global Governance (London: IEA)

Ridley, Matt (1995) Down to Earth: A Contrarian View of Environmental Problems (London: IEA)

Ridley, Matt (1996) Down to Earth II: Combating Environmental Myths (London: IEA)

Smith, FL Jr (1996) Learning from the Past, Freeing Up the Future: The Political Economy of Regulatory Change (London: IEA)

Stott, Philip (1999) Tropical Rainforest: A Political Economy of Hegemonic Mythmaking (London: IEA)

Other publications in a broadly similar vein include:

Beckerman, Wilfred (1974, 1976) In Defense of Economic Growth (Cape)

Beckerman, Wilfred (1995) Small is Stupid: Blowing the Whistle on the Greens (Duckworth)
also published as:
Beckerman, Wilfred (1996) Through Green-Colored Glasses: Environmentalism Reconsidered (Cato Institute)

Simon, Julian L (1981) The Ultimate Resource (Princeton: Princeton University Press)

Simon, Julian L and Kahn, Herman (1984) The Resourceful Earth (Oxford: Blackwell)

Conversely, some students may be equally challenged in their thinking by radically ‘pro-environmental’ works such as:

Capra, F (1982) The Turning Point - Science, Society and the Rising Culture (London: Collins)

Ekins, Paul (1992) Wealth Beyond Measure: Atlas of New Economics (London: Gaia Books)

Lovelock, James E (1987, 1995) Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth (Oxford: Oxford UP)

Lovelock, James E (1988, 1995) The Ages of Gaia: A Biography of Our Living Earth (Oxford: Oxford UP)

Lovelock, James E (1991) Gaia: The Practical Science of Planetary Medicine (London: Gaia Books)

Russell, Peter (1991) The Awakening Earth: The Global Brain (London: Arkana)

Schumacher, Ernst F (1973) Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered (London: Blond and Briggs. Also London: Abacus, 1974; and London: Vintage, 1993)

Sheldrake, Rupert (1990) The Rebirth of Nature: the Greening of Science and God (London: Rider)

Finally, a Marxist perspective - which rejects the ‘New Age’ and individualistic ‘green lifestyle’ approaches associated with many of the above - is provided in:

Johnston, R J (1989) Environmental Problems: Nature, Economy and State (London: Belhaven)

8. Instructions to students

The book review should be of no more than 1000 words, and should follow the conventions adopted by authors of published reviews. (With this in mind, you are strongly recommended to examine some published reviews, before writing your own.) It should include the following elements:

• Full bibliographic details of the book being reviewed.
• 'Biographical' information about the author, and/or 'sponsor' of the publication, particularly that which may have a bearing upon the views expressed in the book itself.
• A summary and contextualisation of the book in its field - its aims, scope and thesis or main propositions, and how these compare with other publications in the same field; the arguments, evidence (including sources used) and findings; the target readership.
• An evaluation of the book - the quality of its arguments and evidence, and the validity of its conclusions; the extent to which it meets its aims and fulfils the needs of its target readership; the value of its contribution to the literature; its literary merits; its production qualities; a personal recommendation - to read, or not to read.

It may be helpful to write your review with a particular readership in mind, whether this be real or imagined - for example, readers of the imaginary journal Climate Change International - since this is what most reviewers do, in practice.

9. Stimulus Material

None.

10. Degree stage

This TLR requires students to recognise, comprehend and critically analyse a distinctive environmental perspective - for example, in terms of scientific or philosophical argument. It is most appropriately used with students who are operating at academic level 3 or above.

11. Resource requirements

None.

12. Preparation

None

13. Links with other TLRs

The aims and/or learning outcomes of this TLR are related to those of other TLRs listed in the following 'thematic cluster':

• Critical thinking skills

14. Follow-up activities

None.

15. Recommended reading

Study skills - including critical thinking - texts do not generally cover book reviewing per se. Nonetheless, the following are examples of books that do offer relevant advice - variously on ‘active reading’ and on identifying and evaluating arguments:

Grinols, Anne Bradstreet (1988) Critical Thinking: Reading and Writing Across the Curriculum (Wadsworth)
Includes useful textual evaluation exercises, including some scientific passages.

Maker, Janet and Lenier, Minnette (1996) Academic Reading with Active Critical Thinking (Wadsworth)
Includes useful textual evaluation exercises, including some environmental/scientific examples.

Ruggiero, Vincent Ryan (1999) Becoming a Critical Thinker, 3rd edition (Houghton Mifflin)
Lively and interesting approach to critical evaluation of academic and non-academic sources.

Thomson, Anne (1996) Critical Reasoning: A Practical Introduction (Routledge)
Includes useful textual evaluation exercises, including some environmental/scientific examples.

Thomson, Anne (1998) Critical Reasoning in Ethics: A Practical Introduction (Routledge)
Similar approach to the above.