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This portion of the White Library site is dedicated to documenting the scholarly output of our faculty. This is by no means an all-inclusive list and there are many citations yet to be added. Clicking the title will either take you to the item’s location in the library catalog or database, or to an outside link where you can purchase it. If would like to suggest a faculty publication to be included, please send link to the source and a Chicago Style citation to facultypublications@arbor.edu.

Jonathan Rinck

By on March 2, 2013 in Faculty Publications

Rinck, Jonathan. “Pewabic Pottery Among the Peacocks: The Partnership of Charles Lang Freer and Mary Chase Perry-Stratton.” Ceramics: Art & Perception no. 91 (March 2013): 62-64.

Abstract: The peacock room is one of the most well-known products of the 19th century aesthetic movement, perhaps largely because of the story of its creation. American artist James McNeil Whistler painted the room in 1876-1877 which, at the time, belonged to the London home of Frederick Leyland. Although he was only supposed to retouch a botched paint job by a previous artist, Whistler famously gave the room a complete makeover while Leyland was away. Upon his return, Leyland was mortified and fired Whistler, but this did not stop the tenacious Whistler from returning and adding the now famous peacocks on the wall. In 1904, the room (and the Whistler paintings it contained) was acquired by Charles Freer and brought to the US, where it eventually became the centrepiece of the Freer Art Gallery. Freer purchased the room specifically to display his collection of Asian pottery. But Freer also used the room to display the ceramic pottery of Mary Chase Perry- Stratton (1867-1961). In fact, Perry-Stratton’s ceramics were the only works by a contemporary artist that Freer ever displayed in the room. Although the Peacock room is mostly associated with Whistler, Perry-Stratton’s ceramics once assumed a visibly robust presence in their own right.

Kathleen Wilcox

By on January 24, 2013 in Faculty Publications

Wilcox, Kathleen A., Elizabeth Murakami-Ramalho, and Angela Urick. “Just-in-time Pedagogy: Teachers’ Perspectives on the Response to Intervention Framework.” Journal of Research in Reading 36, no. 1 (February 2013): 75–95. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9817.2011.01494.x.

Abstract: The purpose of this mixed methods research is to examine teachers’ perspectives on the response to intervention (RTI) framework and its implementation in Michigan and Texas schools. Both states have been leaders in literacy, increasing preservice and in-service teacher certification standards and developing similar batteries for assessing literacy skills. Using the International Reading Association’s RTI principles, the following question directed this inquiry: what are the perspectives of teachers in various educational, geographic, economic and cultural settings of the RTI? The research was developed through questionnaires, focus groups and semi-structured interviews. Findings revealed that teacher professional development, assessments and collaboration for instruction were highly integrated themes when developing RTI strategies as reforming practice and increasing student literacy. Michigan and Texas teachers were more confident and comfortable in measuring and identifying students with reading difficulties over their ability to prevent learning disabilities through their instruction.

Jonathan Rinck

By on November 21, 2012 in Faculty Publications

Rinck, Jonathan. “Maria Spilsbury (1776-1820): Artist and Evangelical.” CAA Reviews (March 22, 2012): 1.

Abstract: In her short biographical work Father and Daughter: Jonathan and Maria Spilsbury (London: Epworth, 1952), Ruth Young, a descendant of Maria Spilsbury (Spilsbury-Taylor, after her marriage in 1808), recounts a delightful anecdote in which the future KingGeorge IV visited Spilsbury’s studio on St. George’s Row, London. Impatient with how slowly work was progressing on his commission which, to his judgment, seemed complete, he exclaimed, “Really, Mrs. Taylor, I swear that you can do no more to that! You’ve finished it and a damned good picture it is.” Unconvinced, Spilsbury sought a second opinion from her maid. Upon close inspection, the maid astutely pointed out that, distressingly, the woman sewing in the painting still lacked a thimble. At this, the exasperated prince, Young writes, chased the maid out of the room, “her cap-strings flying” (32). Any other artist might have obligingly yielded to the prince, but such was Spilsbury’s notoriety that visits from the Prince Regent, her chief patron, were merely commonplace.

Thomas Kuntzleman

By on November 13, 2012 in Faculty Publications

Kuntzleman, Thomas Scott, Kristen Rohrer, and Emeric Schultz. “The Chemistry of Lightsticks: Demonstrations To Illustrate Chemical Processes.” Journal of Chemical Education 89, no. 7 (2012): 910–916.

Abstract: Lightsticks, or glowsticks as they are sometimes called, are perhaps the chemist’s quintessential toy. Because they are easy to activate and appealing to observe, experimenting with lightsticks provides a great way to get young people interested in science. Thus, we have used lightsticks to teach chemical concepts in a variety of outreach settings and demonstration shows. Although these devices are simple to operate, a working lightstick depends upon a rich array of physicochemical processes. For example, the chemical processes involved in lightsticks include acid–base chemistry, redox reactions, quantum chemistry, and thermodynamics. Consequently, we have used lightstick experiments and demonstrations in general, inorganic, and physical chemistry classes. In this paper, we share some experiments and demonstrations with lightsticks that we have used in these various educational settings.

Jeffery Bilbro

By on November 13, 2012 in Faculty Publications

Bilbro, Jeffrey. “The Ecological Thought.(Book Review).” Christianity and Literature no. 4 (2012): 693.

Abstract: In his latest book, Timothy Morton provides those scholars who are interested in the growing field of ecocriticism but not sure what all the fuss is about with a provocative, accessible introduction to the radical implications and intriguing possibilities that ecology offers for cultural theory. Those looking for literary analysis or an overview ofthe current state of environmental literary theory should turn elsewhere—starting with Lawrence Bueil’s excellent, if now slightly dated. The Future of Environmental Criticism: Environmental Crisis and Literary Imagination (2005). In The Ecological Thought, Morton leaves behind the close textual analysis, high-level theory, and, thankfully, the impenetrable prose, of his previous book. Ecology without Nature: Rethinking Environmental Aesthetics (2007). Instead, he offers a series of probing thought experiments and far-reaching cultural and theoretical analyses that explore ecology’s cultural implications. Morton’s style embodies the provocative irony that he argues the ecological thought demands as he takes on the role of “the irritating Columbo-style guy at the back of the room, the one who asks the unanswerable question” (115). So while many of Morton’s answers suggest that his conception of :he ecological thought is not as radical as he thinks it is, or as it perhaps should be, his questions challenge scholars in the liberal arts to wrestle with the consequences of ecology’s recent scientific discoveries.

Jeffrey Bilbro

By on September 26, 2012 in Faculty Publications

Bilbro, Jeffrey. “Who Are Lost and How They’re Found: Redemption and Theodicy in Wheatley, Newton, and Cowper.” Early American Literature 47, no. 3 (2012): 561–589. doi:10.1353/eal.2012.0054.

Abstract: The article critiques poems which focus on the themes of redemption, theodicy and the African American slave trade, including the poem “On the Death of the Rev. Mr. George Whitefield,” by Phillis Wheatley, “Olney Hymns,” by John Newton and “Charity,” by William Cowper. The relationship between the poetry of Newton, Wheatley and Cowper and the abolition movement is discussed.

Brent Cline

By on September 26, 2012 in Faculty Publications

Cline, Brent Walter. “‘ You’re Not the Same Kind of Human Being’: The Evolution of Pity to Horror in Daniel Keyes’ Flowers for Algernon.” Disability Studies Quarterly 32, no. 4 (2012).

Abstract: Of American novels that engage with the topic of mental disability, few are more popular than Daniel Keyes’s Flowers for Algernon. Such popularity seems based on a simplistic reading of the novel where the mentally disabled are objects of good-natured compassion. A more thorough reading of how Charlie Gordon is presented, however, leads to the conclusion that mental disability is the embodiment of death in the novel. Readers are first taught to pity the pre-operative Charlie, but once they come to respond to the ethical voice of the post-operative Charlie, his regression to his original state becomes the rhetorical villain in the novel. At first an object of pity, the mentally disabled Charlie Gordon eventually becomes the metaphorical horror of oblivion that no character has the power to overcome.

Mark Edwards

By on July 25, 2012 in Faculty Publications

Edwards, Mark Thomas. The Right of the Protestant Left: God’s Totalitarianism. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.

The Right of the Protestant LeftThe Right of the Protestant Left explores the centrality of religious realignment for the development of American and global politics through the story of the ‘Christian Realists’ who led the American Protestant left after World War I. As a public theological community with transnational ties, the Realists attacked modern civilization, preached participatory democratic relations, and called for an ecumenical world Protestantism. Ultimately, in religion as well as in politics, the Realists and their associates at home and abroad proved to be the authentic religious right of their era. This valuable study thus highlights the conservative strain latent within twentieth-century American liberalism.

Robert Woods

By on July 2, 2012 in Faculty Publications

Woods, Robert H., Diane M. Badzinski, Janie M. Harden Fritz, and Sarah E. Yeates. “The ‘Ideal Professor’ and Gender Effects in Christian Higher Education.” Christian Higher Education 11, no. 3 (July 2012): 158–176.

Abstract: A survey was administered to 451 undergraduate students at a private liberal arts Christian university to identify students’ perceptions of the ideal professor. The survey revealed that the ideal professor places great emphasis on the integration of faith and learning, is flexible (and even easy), maintains high academic standards, encourages students, and has an adaptive teaching style. Findings also highlighted gender differences in student perception of the ideal professor. Women perceived an adaptable teaching style, encouragement, and integration of faith and learning as slightly more important than men did in defining the characteristics of an ideal professor. Implications are framed in terms of student expectations for content and relationship dimensions of learning associated with Christian colleges and universities.

Mark Correll

By on December 13, 2011 in Faculty Publications

Correll, Mark R. “The Reformation of Feeling: Shaping the Religious Emotions in Early Modern Germany.” Fides et Historia 43, no. 1 (December 1, 2011): 73–75.

Abstract: In a well-written study, The Reformation of Feeling: Shaping the Religious Emotions in Early Modern Germany, Susan C. Karant-Nunn has introduced a new lens by which to study the Reformations. Karant-Nunn takes a broad range of published sermons from pre-and post-Tridentine Catholics, as well as both Lutheran and Reformed Protestants, and reads them for their affective language. In doing this, she confirms and deepens many other historical interpretations of the Reformation era.