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Open Textbook Library

Browse OER Textbooks from the University of Minnesota's Open Textbook Library. These textbooks are authored and peer reviewed by faculty or other accredited subject matter experts. Many of these textbooks are actively used to teach OER based courses at instiutions across the United States. 

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About Writing: A Guide
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CC BY
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Revised Edition

Short Description:
This writer’s reference condenses and covers everything a beginning writing student needs to successfully compose college-level work, including the basics of composition, grammar, and research. It is broken down into easy-to-tackle sections, while not overloading students with more information than they need. Great for any beginning writing students or as reference for advanced students! Order a print copy: http://www.lulu.com/shop/robin-jeffrey/about-writing/paperback/product-23853977.html

Long Description:
This writer’s reference condenses and covers everything a beginning writing student should need to successfully compose college-level work. The book covers the basics of composition and revising, including how to build a strong thesis, how to peer review a fellow student’s work, and a handy checklist for revision, before moving on to a broad overview of academic writing. Included for those students who need writing help at the most basic level are comprehensive sections on sentence style and grammar, verbs, nouns and other tenets of basic grammar. Finally, the sections on research and citation should help any student find solid evidence for their school work and cite it correctly, as well as encouraging an understanding of why citation is so important in the first place. This is a guide that is useful to writing students of all levels, either as a direct teaching tool or a simple reference.

This revised edition incorporates new sections on revision, citation, and rhetorical concepts. More example text has been provided and the contents have been reorganized to optimize flow and student comprehension. The first edition remains available at About Writing.

Order a print copy: http://www.lulu.com/shop/robin-jeffrey/about-writing/paperback/product-23853977.html

Word Count: 11905

ISBN: 978-1-63635-000-4

(Note: This resource's metadata has been created automatically by reformatting and/or combining the information that the author initially provided as part of a bulk import process.)

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
Open Oregon Educational Resources
Author:
Robin Jeffrey
Date Added:
06/14/2016
American Literature I: An Anthology of Texts From Early America Through the Civil War
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CC BY-SA
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Long Description:
This book offers an anthology of texts that includes letters, journals, poetry, newspaper articles, pamphlets, sermons, narratives, and short fiction written in and about America beginning with collected oral stories from Native American tribes and ending with the poetry of Emily Dickinson. Many major and minor authors are included, providing a sampling of the different styles, topics, cultures, and concerns present during the formation and development of America through the mid-nineteenth century.

Word Count: 481042

(Note: This resource's metadata has been created automatically by reformatting and/or combining the information that the author initially provided as part of a bulk import process.)

Subject:
English Language Arts
Reading Literature
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
Virtual Library of Virginia Open Publishing
Author:
Jenifer Kurtz
Date Added:
08/16/2019
Antiracist Writing Assessment Ecologies: Teaching and Assessing Writing for a Socially Just Future
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CC BY-NC-ND
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In Antiracist Writing Assessment Ecologies, Asao B. Inoue theorizes classroom writing assessment as a complex system that is "more than" its interconnected elements. To explain how and why antiracist work in the writing classroom is vital to literacy learning, Inoue incorporates ideas about the white racial habitus that informs dominant discourses in the academy and other contexts. Inoue helps teachers understand the unintended racism that often occurs when teachers do not have explicit antiracist agendas in their assessments. Drawing on his own teaching and classroom inquiry, Inoue offers a heuristic for developing and critiquing writing assessment ecologies that explores seven elements of any writing assessment ecology: power, parts, purposes, people, processes, products, and places.

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
WAC Clearinghouse
Author:
Asao B. Inoue
Date Added:
01/01/2017
Antología abierta de literatura hispana
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CC BY
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3a. edición

Short Description:
Una antología crítica de textos literarios del mundo hispanohablante. Se enfoca en autores canónicos y también se intenta incluir voces marginadas. Cada texto tiene una introducción y anotaciones creadas por estudiantes. // A critical anthology of literary texts from the Spanish-speaking world. A focus on canonical authors and an attempt to include voices that have been marginalized. Each text includes an introduction and annotations created by students. This Anthology was put together by Dr. Julie Ward and the students in her Introduction to Hispanic Literature course. We are looking for faculty to implement a similar Edición Crítica assignment in their classrooms to produce student-created critical editions that will expand the Anthology. If you are interested, let us know in the Rebus Community Forum.

Word Count: 90805

(Note: This resource's metadata has been created automatically by reformatting and/or combining the information that the author initially provided as part of a bulk import process.)

Subject:
English Language Arts
Reading Literature
Material Type:
Textbook
Author:
Julie Ward
Date Added:
04/01/2022
Arguments in Context
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CC BY-NC
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An Introduction to Critical Thinking

Short Description:
Arguments in Context is a comprehensive introduction to critical thinking that covers all the basics in student-friendly language. Intended for use in a semester-long course, the text features classroom-tested examples and exercises that have been chosen to emphasize the relevance and applicability of the subject to everyday life. Three themes are developed as the text proceeds from argument identification and analysis, to the standards and techniques of evaluation: (i) the importance of asking the right questions, (ii) the influence of biases, cognitive illusions, and other psychological factors, and (iii) the ways that social situations and structures can enhance and impoverish our thinking. On this last point, the text includes sustained discussion of disagreement, cooperative dialogue, testimony, trust, and social media. Overall, the text aims to equip readers with a set of tools for working through important decisions and disagreements, and to help them become more careful and active thinkers.

Long Description:
Arguments in Context is a comprehensive introduction to critical thinking that covers all the basics in student-friendly language. Intended for use in a semester-long course, the text features classroom-tested examples and exercises that have been chosen to emphasize the relevance and applicability of the subject to everyday life. Three themes are developed as the text proceeds from argument identification and analysis, to the standards and techniques of evaluation: (i) the importance of asking the right questions, (ii) the influence of biases, cognitive illusions, and other psychological factors, and (iii) the ways that social situations and structures can enhance and impoverish our thinking. On this last point, the text includes sustained discussion of disagreement, cooperative dialogue, testimony, trust, and social media. Overall, the text aims to equip readers with a set of tools for working through important decisions and disagreements, and to help them become more careful and active thinkers.

Word Count: 96327

(Note: This resource's metadata has been created automatically as part of a bulk import process by reformatting and/or combining the information that the author initially provided. As a result, there may be errors in formatting.)

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
Muhlenberg College
Author:
Thaddeus Robinson
Date Added:
11/18/2021
Bad Ideas About Writing
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CC BY-NC-ND
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Bad Ideas About Writing counters major myths about writing instruction. Inspired by the provocative science- and social-science-focused book This Idea Must Die and written for a general audience, the collection offers opinionated, research-based statements intended to spark debate and to offer a better way of teaching writing. Contributors, as scholars of rhetoric and composition, provide a snapshot of and antidotes to major myths in writing instruction. This collection is published in whole by the Digital Publishing Institute at WVU Libraries and in part by Inside Higher Ed.

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Material Type:
Teaching/Learning Strategy
Provider:
West Virginia University
Provider Set:
Open Access Textbooks
Author:
Cheryl E. Ball
Drew M. Loewe
Date Added:
01/01/2017
Bate-Papo
Unrestricted Use
CC BY
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An Introduction to Portuguese

Word Count: 95446

(Note: This resource's metadata has been created automatically by reformatting and/or combining the information that the author initially provided as part of a bulk import process.)

Subject:
Arts and Humanities
English Language Arts
Languages
Material Type:
Textbook
Author:
Author:Eduardo Viana da Silva
Date Added:
11/12/2021
Beyond Argument: Essaying as a Practice of (Ex)Change
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CC BY-NC-ND
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Beyond Argument offers an in-depth examination of how current ways of thinking about the writer-page relation in personal essays can be reconceived according to practices in the care of the self — an ethic by which writers such as Seneca, Montaigne, and Nietzsche lived. This approach promises to reinvigorate the form and address many of the concerns expressed by essay scholars and writers regarding the lack of rigorous exploration we see in our students' personal essays — and sometimes, even, in our own. In pursuing this approach, Sarah Allen presents a version of subjectivity that enables productive debate in the essay, among essays, and beyond.

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
WAC Clearinghouse
Author:
Sarah Allen
Date Added:
01/01/2015
Beyond Dichotomy: Synergizing Writing Center and Classroom Pedagogies
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CC BY-NC-ND
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How closely can or should writing centers and writing classrooms collaborate? Beyond Dichotomy explores how research on peer tutoring one-to-one and in small groups can inform our work with students in writing centers and other tutoring programs, as well as in writing courses and classrooms. These multi-method (including rhetorical and discourse analyses and ethnographic and case-study) investigations center on several course-based tutoring (CBT) partnerships at two universities. Rather than practice separately in the center or in the classroom, rather than seeing teacher here and tutor there and student over there, CBT asks all participants in the dynamic drama of teaching and learning to consider the many possible means of connecting synergistically.

This book offers the "more-is-more" value of designing more peer-to-peer learning situations for developmental and multicultural writers, and a more elaborate view of what happens in these peer-centered learning environments. It offers important implications—especially of directive and nondirective tutoring strategies and methods—for peer-to-peer learning and one-to-one tutoring and conferencing for all teachers and learners of writing.

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
WAC Clearinghouse
Author:
Steven J. Corbett
Date Added:
01/01/2015
Business Communication for Success
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CC BY-NC-SA
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Business Communication for Success (BCS) provides a comprehensive, integrated approach to the study and application of written and oral business communication to serve both student and professor.

Subject:
Business and Communication
English Language Arts
Language, Grammar and Vocabulary
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
University of Minnesota
Provider Set:
University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing
Author:
Scott McLean
Date Added:
01/01/2010
Business Writing Style Guide
Conditional Remix & Share Permitted
CC BY-NC-SA
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Short Description:
In light of the cost of textbooks and education in general, we undertook this project to create a free resource to be used broadly by students in a business context. We wanted to provide comprehensive coverage of the writing process, but keep our topics relevant to business education. We hope that this textbook provides equal value to both non- and native-English learners alike. Just like we acknowledge that students will continue to develop their writing skills, we expect this project to challenge and further our own skills as writers. Data dashboard

Word Count: 28533

(Note: This resource's metadata has been created automatically by reformatting and/or combining the information that the author initially provided as part of a bulk import process.)

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
Oregon State University
Author:
John Morris
Julie Swart
Date Added:
12/01/2018
The Centrality of Style
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CC BY-NC-ND
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In The Centrality of Style, editors Mike Duncan and Star Medzerian Vanguri argue that style is a central concern of composition studies even as they demonstrate that some of the most compelling work in the area has emerged from the margins of the field. Calling attention to this paradox in his foreword to the collection, Paul Butler observes, "Many of the chapters work within the liminal space in which style serves as both a centralizing and decentralizing force in rhetoric and composition. Clearly, the authors and editors have made an invaluable contribution in their collection by exposing the paradoxical nature of a canon that continues to play a vital role in our disciplinary history."

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
WAC Clearinghouse
Author:
Mike Duncan
Star Medzerian Vanguri
Date Added:
02/17/2013
A Christmas Carol
Unrestricted Use
CC BY
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A Holiday Ghost Story by Charles Dickens with Illustrations by John Leech

Short Description:
This version of the classic holiday story has been slightly abridged and lightly adapted for advanced students of English language. The text includes comprehension checks, discussion questions, and collaborative activities. Order a print copy: https://www.lulu.com/en/us/shop/timothy-krause/a-christmas-carol/paperback/product-vqrgq7.html

Long Description:
This version of the classic holiday story has been slightly abridged and lightly adapted for advanced students of English language. The text includes comprehension checks, discussion questions, and collaborative activities.

Word Count: 11147

ISBN: 978-1-63635-010-3

(Note: This resource's metadata has been created automatically by reformatting and/or combining the information that the author initially provided as part of a bulk import process.)

Subject:
English Language Arts
Reading Foundation Skills
Material Type:
Textbook
Author:
Charles Dickens
Date Added:
12/13/2019
The Commons: Tools for Reading, Writing, and Rhetoric
Unrestricted Use
CC BY
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The Commons: Tools for Reading, Writing, and Rhetoric gives instructors and students of college writing courses a single source for information on metacognitive critical reading, rhetorical awareness, and MLA formatting basics as well as interesting and relevant reading and viewing content. Its approach is interdisciplinary, bringing in material from ecology, sociology, psychology, technology, popular culture, political science, cultural studies, and literature. Each essay, website, video, infographic, and poem has been carefully chosen to speak to the Eastern Kentucky University community, but everyone can find something that speaks to our common human experience and our need to communicate and connect with one another.

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Reading Literature
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
Eastern Kentucky University
Author:
Dominic J Ashby
Eastern Kentucky University
Jill M Parrott
Jonathon Collins
Date Added:
11/10/2022
Conventions 101
Conditional Remix & Share Permitted
CC BY-NC
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A Functional Approach to Teaching (and Assessing!) Grammar and Punctuation

Short Description:
This is a collection of cumulative units of study for conventional errors common in student writing. It's flexible, functional, and zeroes in problems typically seen in writing of all types, from the eternal "there/they're/their" struggle to correct colon use. Units are organized from most simple to most challenging.

Long Description:
This is a collection of cumulative units of study for conventional errors common in student writing. It’s flexible, functional, and zeroes in problems typically seen in writing of all types, from the eternal “there/they’re/their” struggle to correct colon use. Units are organized from most simple to most challenging.

Word Count: 2751

ISBN: 978-1-63635-026-4

(Note: This resource's metadata has been created automatically by reformatting and/or combining the information that the author initially provided as part of a bulk import process.)

Subject:
English Language Arts
Language, Grammar and Vocabulary
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
Open Oregon Educational Resources
Author:
Chauna Ramsey
Date Added:
09/06/2016
Copy(write): Intellectual Property in the Writing Classroom
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CC BY-NC-ND
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The editors of Copy(write): Intellectual Property in the Writing Classroom bring together stories, theories, and research that can further inform the ways in which we situate and address intellectual property issues in our writing classrooms. The essays in the collection identify and describe a wide range of pedagogical strategies, consider theories, present research, explore approaches, and offer both cautionary tales and local and contextual successes that can further inform the ways in which we situate and address intellectual property issues in our teaching.

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
WAC Clearinghouse
Author:
Danielle Nicole DeVoss
Martine Courant Rife
Shaun Slattery
Date Added:
08/04/2011
Critical Expressivism: Theory and Practice in the Composition Classroom
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CC BY-NC-ND
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Critical Expressivism is an ambitious attempt to re-appropriate intellectual territory that has more often been charted by its detractors than by its proponents. Indeed, as Peter Elbow observes in his contribution to this volume, "As far as I can tell, the term 'expressivist' was coined and used only by people who wanted a word for people they disapproved of and wanted to discredit." The editors and contributors to this collection invite readers to join them in a new conversation, one informed by "a belief that the term expressivism continues to have a vitally important function in our field."

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
WAC Clearinghouse
Author:
Tara Roeder
Date Added:
11/28/2014
Culturas hispanas a través de la pantalla / Hispanic Cultures Through the Screen
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CC BY-NC-SA
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Short Description:
Este libro de texto busca fomentar el visionado crítico de productos audiovisuales contemporáneos y el reflexionar sobre la representación de las culturas hispanas en webseries y vídeos musicales. This textbook aims to promote critical viewing of contemporary audiovisual products and thinking about the representation of Hispanic cultures in web series and music videos.

Long Description:
Culturas hispanas a través de la pantalla busca fomentar el visionado crítico de productos audiovisuales contemporáneos y el reflexionar sobre la representación de las culturas hispanas en webseries y vídeos musicales. La difusión y la popularidad de estos dos géneros justifican que se les dedique espacio en el currículo junto a otros géneros audiovisuales más consagrados, caso de los cortos y los largometrajes. El libro se ofrece en inglés y en español para que pueda ser utilizado en una amplia variedad de disciplinas académicas. Asimismo, el libro está organizado en unidades didácticas independientes, las cuales presentan diferentes estructuras y temáticas de forma que el profesor/a pueda seleccionar aquellas que mejor se ajusten a los objetivos concretos de su curso. Hispanic Cultures Through the Screen aims to promote critical viewing of contemporary audiovisual products and thinking about the representation of Hispanic cultures in web series and music videos. Increasing popularity of these two genres justify dedicating part of the curriculum to them along with other more established audiovisual genres, such as short and feature films. The book is presented in English and Spanish so that it can be used in a wide variety of courses. Finally, it is organized into separate units (each based on a different audiovisual product) with different themes, structures and length, so that teachers can select those units that interest them the most for a specific course.

Word Count: 52525

(Note: This resource's metadata has been created automatically by reformatting and/or combining the information that the author initially provided as part of a bulk import process.)

Subject:
Career and Technical Education
English Language Arts
Ethnic Studies
Film and Music Production
Social Science
Sociology
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
Bemidji State University
Author:
Ana M. López-Aguilera
Date Added:
10/25/2021
A Dam Good Argument
Unrestricted Use
CC BY
Rating
0.0 stars

Persuasive Writing at Oregon State University

Short Description:
Arguments are all around us. Everywhere we look, someone is trying to get our attention, change our minds, or sell us something. Learning about how persuasion works will make you a more thoughtful and skeptical consumer of all that content, so that you can come to your own conclusions and recognize the underlying assumptions that inform those attempts to persuade you. This book is about analyzing others' arguments and crafting your own. The rhetorical choices that you make as a writer–from evidence to structure to tone–impact how your audience will receive your ideas. Using those tools effectively will help your voice be heard. Data dashboard

Word Count: 96049

ISBN: 978-1-955101-34-9

(Note: This resource's metadata has been created automatically by reformatting and/or combining the information that the author initially provided as part of a bulk import process.)

Subject:
Composition and Rhetoric
English Language Arts
Reading Literature
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
Oregon State University
Author:
Amy Guptill
Anjali Pattanayak
Carol Burnell
Emily A Wierszewski
Jaime Wood
Kenneth Burke
Kristy Kelly
Laura Bolin Carol
Laura Giovanelli
Liz Delf
Mike Caulfield
Monique Babin
Nicole Rosevear
Quentin Vieregge
Rebecca Jones
Rob Drummond
Shane Abrams
Susan Pesznecker
Date Added:
10/01/2022
"The Death of Ivan Ilich": An Electronic Study Edition of the Russian Text
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CC BY-NC
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0.0 stars

Short Description:
The Russian text of "The Death of Ivan Ilich" is presented for study in various formats: accompanied by an English translation; fully glossed, with explanatory and interpretive annotations; and supplemented by introductory remarks and an extensive bibliography.

Long Description:
The Russian text of “The Death of Ivan Ilich” is presented for study in various formats: accompanied by an English translation; fully glossed, with explanatory and interpretive annotations; and supplemented by introductory remarks and an extensive bibliography.

Word Count: 211581

ISBN: 978-1-946135-69-8

(Note: This resource's metadata has been created automatically by reformatting and/or combining the information that the author initially provided as part of a bulk import process.)

Subject:
English Language Arts
Reading Literature
Material Type:
Textbook
Provider:
University of Minnesota
Author:
Gary R. Jahn
Date Added:
12/31/2020