Nurturing Graduate Students: Integrative Scholarship through Textbook Projects

Abstract

TEXTBOOKS ARE CONTROVERSIAL in sociology. Some professors refuse to use textbooks in their courses, believing that they are too simplistic. Others view textbooks as effective conduits of sociological knowledge. As an example of this latter position, a recent critique of current family textbooks created a furor in sociology and the national media because of their alleged bias (Glenn 1997; Footnotes 1998). Implicit in Glenn's critique was that textbooks impart learning. Further evidence of the importance of textbooks in the learning process is found in the Teaching Sociology special issue devoted to textbooks (1988; see also Agger 1989; and Kendall 1999). The corporatization of textbooks is yet another area of concern. With the increased frequency of mergers among publishing companies, there are not only fewer publishing outlets but also increasing pressures on authors to clone successful books, thereby squelching creativity. An additional controversy involving textbooks is whether they are limited only to transmitting existing knowledge (Tischler 1988). From this position, textbook writing is neither scholarly nor creative. We argue, to the contrary, that textbooks are not limited to the synthesis of existing materials in marketable ways, but that they are capable of actually shaping the