Rating: 
Summary: Leftist Liberal Nonsense
Review: Another leftist propaganda book saying the United States is a bad place. Pushes its own liberal agenda.
Rating:
Summary: Curious
Review: Curious how so much propaganda can be infused into a book which is is supposed to be a writing primer. If you can get around the America bashing it will rise all the way up to a rating of worthless. One star is one more than it rates.
Rating:
Summary: Curious
Review: Curious how so much propaganda can be infused into a book which is is supposed to be a writing primer. If you can get around the America bashing it will rise all the way up to a rating of worthless. One star is one more than it rates.
Rating: 
Summary: Fantastic.
Review: Every essay in this fabulous book is enjoyable, readable, and enlightening. We learn the experiences of women, African-Americans, Latinos, Asians, working people and many other groups through the voices of people in those groups. The selections are both autobiographical and fictional. I assign this book to classes from high school through graduate school, and I also give it to my friends. It's good!!!
Rating:
Summary: Best textbook I've ever had
Review: I had to read this for my college Freshman English class, and I have to say that I looked forward to reading assignments from it. It is a great book with fascinating, in-depth, eloquent essays about the "myths" of our American culture. Highly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: A good look at how ideology influences social experience
Review: I have read this book and have used it in a class for advanced EFL students studying the US.While I would agree that there is clearly an editorial bias in the book, the selection of most of the pieces published is *excellent*. The organizational idea is perfect for courses which examine/explore main social values in US society, and is useful in discussing the whole topic of 'diversity' as it is thrown around in the US and elsewhere. I do think the editors could have been less heavy handed with their interpretation of what is 'critical thinking'. There is an introduction for each piece which, in my view, tries to force a particular viewpoint rather than simply challenge an existing one or open a topic for broader examination. The editors don't leave much room for those with more conservative views, and I think that this detracts from the credibility of the book as a whole. I found this book extremely useful with my students, most of whom (unlike US college students) have very little experience with academic material that challenges mainstream or traditional thinking. Students should be made to understand that they needn't accept the perspective of the editor or author outright...Critical Thinking includes challenging the challengers!
Rating:
Summary: A great text for challenging students to think critically...
Review: I have used this book several times now, and while I have had a few neo-conservative students (like those writing the more scathing comments here) who have initially bristled at the more left-leaning readings, those same students are happy to find that voices from their world (i.e. Michael Medved, Danielle Crittenden) are also represented. In fact, these students have left my class stating that the book surprised them, got them to think about these issues from different perspectives. While it certainly didn't turn them into activists for the left, it did get them to think more critically about the propaganda they are fed from ALL sides of the political spectrum, and it also helped them to decipher solid argument from fallacy-driven writing.
The reason I chose to use this book was that I wanted a text that gracefully integrated voices from a multitude of class, race, gender, and political standpoints. This text does just that. We don't just hear from dead white guys and a few token voices of color and gender. Rather, we hear from people of all different lived experiences--everyone from Dan Rather to June Jordan.
The editors also include some helpful tips for using this book in a composition classroom, which many instructors who are wary of using such controversial material will find useful.
Most composition instructors want to help their students think for themselves, to avoid simply parroting what their favorite pundits and talk radio hosts say, and this book, by challenging what we consider norms in our culture, helps to accomplish that by challenging American cultural myths from all sides of the political and social spectrum. However, if you don't like your class discussions to become heated, and if you are scared of ruffling students' feathers, I would recommend a different book. Actually, The Arlington Reader provides a number of similar readings with a much less politically-charged context.
Overall, however, I find this book to be a gem amidst the many cultural readers out there.
Rating:
Summary: Leftist Liberal Nonsense
Review: I used this book while attending an ESL program in California, and i have to say it is one of the best books i have ever read. It opens your mind in every sense, and it helps you understand diversity, culture, family and racial issues in the US. Very enlightning. I highly recommend it, specially for those who want to better understand american society.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent book for foreign people
Review: I used this book while attending an ESL program in California, and i have to say it is one of the best books i have ever read. It opens your mind in every sense, and it helps you understand diversity, culture, family and racial issues in the US. Very enlightning. I highly recommend it, specially for those who want to better understand american society.
Rating:
Summary: Tripe
Review: If you enjoy fluffy propoganda pieces, this is the book for you. The authors implore student-readers to "take a more active role in defining [their] own values, voices, and ways of seeing," but the questions they follow the readings with are preemptive ideological strikes against open inquiry. It's like a peastant trying to debate Stalin on the merits of agricultural collectives. The great irony is that for all their critiques of power structure, they assume the most dominating of all power structures: perspective and truth. It is a classic example of idealogues trying to establish the truth that there is no truth. It works as comedy; it's useless as honest, open inquiry.
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