{"id":9329,"date":"2008-08-13T14:44:49","date_gmt":"2008-08-13T21:44:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stage.headlessnauedu-b6hgdzckfdgxgzhe.westus-01.azurewebsites.net\/?p=9329"},"modified":"2013-05-07T14:58:31","modified_gmt":"2013-05-07T21:58:31","slug":"globalism-survival-among-themes-for-freshman-summer-reading-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/globalism-survival-among-themes-for-freshman-summer-reading-program\/","title":{"rendered":"Globalism, survival among themes for freshman Summer Reading Program"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"A
Author to visit NAU <\/b>
Ishmael Beah’s A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier<\/i> will be required reading in several classes this fall, allowing students to discuss the book in more detail with their peers and colleagues. A series of films throughout the fall semester will further explore African issues, culminating with a special lecture and book signing with Beah at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 2, at Ardrey Auditorium.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Lap tops and rolls of quarters for the laundry aren’t the only “must have” items on student checklists for college. At NAU, incoming freshmen also are bringing their reactions to a story about war through the eyes of a child soldier.<\/p>\n

As part of their acclimation to NAU, each student who attended summer orientation was given a copy of Ishmael Beah’s\u00a0A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier<\/em>. The book was selected for this year’s Summer Reading Program because it offers a perspective that many students will find compelling, said\u00a0Anne Scott<\/strong>, coordinator of the reading program and interim director of the Honors Program.<\/p>\n

“The book’s many themes\u2014growing up, education, ethnicity, racism, suffering and redemption, survival, community, family, violence\u2014lend themselves to far-reaching discussions,” Scott said.<\/p>\n

In\u00a0A Long Way Gone<\/em>, Beah, now 26, tells the riveting story of how at the age of 12, he fled attacking rebels and wandered a land rendered unrecognizable by violence. By 13, he had been picked up by the government army, and Beah, at heart a gentle boy, found that he was capable of truly terrible acts.<\/p>\n

After three years as a soldier, a truck pulled into the army base and Beah and other young soldiers were released by their commander to UNICEF workers. Sent to a rehabilitation center, he struggled to regain his humanity.<\/p>\n

Now in its ninth year at NAU, the Summer Reading Program provides incoming freshmen with a common experience as they begin their college careers. Once on campus, students can use the book to initiate conversations and build community with their new classmates, roommates and instructors.<\/p>\n

Faculty and staff will lead group discussions on\u00a0A Long Way Gone<\/em>\u00a0at 11:30 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 23, as part of NAU’s\u00a0Welcome Week<\/a>, engaging students in an exploration of the book’s style, plot, themes, concerns and implications.<\/p>\n

“The discussions introduce first-year students to the pleasures and rigors of academic dialogue and give them an important opportunity to form connections with faculty and staff and also with their peers,” Scott said.<\/p>\n

She said in addition to finding relevance to the book’s themes, it also was selected because it can help create more awareness of Africa and African conflicts, people and culture.<\/p>\n

“We live in a global culture and want to promote the values and ideas from other cultures from our own,” she said. “Ishmael Beah’s experiences as a child soldier in his home country of Sierra Leone are profoundly moving. We wanted students to be more than just aware of this situation in Africa; we wanted them to open their eyes to the entire interconnection between and among race, ethnicity, drugs, politics, war, violence and community.”<\/p>\n

Information about the Summer Reading Program at NAU is\u00a0online<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lap tops and rolls of quarters for the laundry aren’t the only “must have” items on student checklists for college. At NAU, incoming freshmen also are bringing their reactions to a story about war through the eyes of a child soldier. As part of their acclimation to NAU, each student who attended summer orientation was…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":46,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9329","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-campus-community"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9329","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/46"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9329"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9329\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9329"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9329"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9329"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}