Every social studies curriculum tells a story. It is increasingly apparent that new stories are needed to guide us through the multiple and intersecting crises that have come to define our times. This accessible volume supports student teachers, teachers, and teacher educators to engage critically with the stories that social studies curricula tell and neglect to tell, particularly those that relate and contribute to the root causes of contemporary social and ecological injustices. A balanced and inclusive curriculum necessitates a broad range of stories and perspectives, not just the master narratives of dominant groups. Incorporating a range of pedagogical approaches and spanning a diversity of themes, from representations of Africa in Chinese textbooks, to slavery and the American civil rights movement, to refugees and the role of indigenous knowledge systems in addressing climate breakdown, this volume includes and creatively engages with previously marginalized and silenced stories and perspectives. Both practical and theoretical in its approach, it seeks to provoke, meaningfully support, and inspire educators to incorporate alternative stories or counter-narratives into their social studies teaching. This unique volume is essential reading for student teachers, teachers, teacher educators as well as anyone interested in inspiring children and young people to be open-minded, critically engaged, and empathetic agents of change, committed to addressing realworld social and ecological injustices.

A sweet and clever friendship story in rhyme, about looking past physical differences to appreciate the person (or dragon) underneath. George and Blaise are pen pals, and they write letters to each other about everything: their pets, birthdays, favorite sports, and science fair projects. There’s just one thing that the two friends don’t know: George is a human, while Blaise is a dragon! What will happen when these pen pals finally meet face-to-face? "When I was a kid, my best friend was Josh Funk. Now he's becoming a friend to a whole new generation.”--B.J. Novak, author of The New York Times bestseller The Book With No Pictures

Beyond the Story: American Literary Fiction and the Limits of Materialism argues that theology is crucial to understanding the power of contemporary American stories. By drawing on the theories of M. M. Bakhtin, Christian personalism, and contemporary phenomenology, Lake argues that literary fiction activates an irreducibly personal intersubjectivity between author, reader, and characters. Stories depend on a dignity-granting valuation of the particular lives of ordinary people, which is best described as an act of love that mirrors the love of the divine. Through original readings of the fiction of Philip Roth, Cormac McCarthy, Lydia Davis, Toni Morrison, and others, Lake enters into a dialogue with postsecular theory and cognitive literary studies to reveal the limits of sociobiology’s approach to culture. The result is a book that will remind readers how storytelling continually reaffirms the transcendent value of human beings in an inherently personal cosmos. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of theology and literary studies, as well as a broad audience of readers seeking to engage on a deeper level with contemporary literature.

The revised updated paperback edition features additional material from the 2020 uprising for Black Lives, and features two new essays.

In This Is Me From Now On, Evie’s new friend Francesca thinks life is dull unless you go after and say whatever you want. Evie can’t always tell if she’s horrified or fascinated by everything Francesca convinces her to do, but she ultimately comes to understand friendship on a whole new level.

Speculative fiction is the literature of questions, of challenges and imagination, and what better to question than the ways in which gender and sexuality have been rigidly defined, partitioned off, put in little boxes? These seventeen stories explore the ways in which identity can go beyond binary from space colonies to small college towns, from angels to androids, and from a magical past to other worlds entirely, the authors in this collection have brought to life wonderful tales starring people who proudly define (and redefine) their own genders, sexualities, identities, and so much else in between.

It's been three years since Isobel Crane's sister died. Everyone thinks it was a tragic accident, but Izzy believes Astrid took her own life. When Izzy finds her sister's journal, her suspicions are confirmed. But Izzy isn't prepared for the hostility she must face from her own family and friends as she attempts to reveal Astrid's truth. While attempting to navigate her newly tumultuous life, Izzy realizes she could lose one of the people she loves most to the same darkness that claimed her sister. With her life unraveling at an alarming rate, Izzy is unsure how to do what she believes is right without destroying the relationships most important to her.