Of Dogs & Dissertations: Notes on Writing & Life

Ardra L. Cole 

ISBN 1-894132-34-3

List price $19.95

In Of Dogs & Dissertations: Notes on Writing & Life, Ardra Cole weaves together two important ideas: 1) writing and researching are creative acts of self-understanding; 2) dogs help us construct who we are and what it means to be human. She does so with the assistance andcompany of the three dogs with whom she shares her life and love.

Dogs embody qualities that are lessons to writers (and non-writers alike): humility, nose-to-the-ground discipline, presence, attunement, honesty, patience, humour,dignity, dogged persistence, a basic wisdom about the need for physical, emotional, and intellectual balance, and, of course love, to name but a few. Of Dogs & Dissertations: Notes on Writing & Life is a pocket-sized companion to emerging writers, creative researchers, and all those who know and love dogs. Tucked into a pocket, knapsack, or briefcase it is ready to be picked up and read while waiting for the bus or standing in line at a coffee shop or ticket booth. Lying on a bedside table, desk, or near the kitchen stove it is ready to accompany morning coffee or provide a respite from the computer screen or stirring risotto. Read it to yourself or to a friend. Read it for inspiration or for pleasure or for both. It is intended to make you smile. It is intended to make you think. Perhaps most of all it is intended to give paws (sorry) to reflect on the many ways that life and lives are enriched by the presence and company of dogs.

This book warms your heart, excites your imagination, and leads you to a deep connection within. Through a beautiful collection of vignettes about her dogs, Ardra gifts us with a mirror to help us understand ourselves in reflection. As a doctoral student writing my dissertation I often feel the need for the kind of quiet compassion only my dogs are wise enough to offer. Now I have a new faithful companion in this delicious book. I plan to take it with me everywhere I go, especially when I go into my heart.

Wan Fung Chang-Hamachi, visual artist, scholartist consultant, PhD student, Fielding Graduate University (with Shawldeah and the spirit of Katchileah)

Oh, to be able to write with the way a dog lives: with whole-hearted insouciance, authentic self-expression and tail-wagging grace! Of Dogs and Dissertations suggests how scholars may indeed learn to do so, offering a joyful, insightful and moving read. Seeing my own experiences reflected in these sensually rich and acutely observed pages, I put this lovely book down only to better enjoy a walk with my dog.

Kathleen Vaughan, visual artist and professor, Concordia University (with Baloo and the spirit of Auggie)

Of Place and Memory: A Poetic Journey

John J. Guiney Yallop

ISBN 978-1-894132-36-7

List price $22.95  

Of Place and Memory is a poetic journey through an emotional landscape, as well as a reflection on that journey. The book pulsates with desires for, and struggles with, identities and communities. Memories of/and places are personal, as well as cultural, social, and political; they are also emotional. Of Place and Memory invites the reader into conversation, and creates a space for that conversation.

In the tradition of the American beat poet, Allen Ginsberg, who sought holiness in unsanctioned sex, John Guiney Yallop writes the profane into sacred text. The final poem in his "Catholic terrain" section, titled "Holiness" reads:

Legs spread

to receive —

what sacrament is this?

Guiney Yallop finds the language for his personal pantheon of images — those specific and formative experiences both inside, and outside, of the religious and educational communities. He seeks pattern and image — and ultimately, understanding — of the socio-cultural actions that have both helped and hindered, both formed and 'deformed.' Sexuality is his plumb-line, his wrestling angel from whom he demands blessing.

The poems are bounded by insightful and corroborating guidance for readers interested in exploring what poetic inquiry 'looks like' within the Humanities generally, gender and masculinities studies, Faculties of Education, Faculties of Theology, and the broader literary communities. Guiney Yallop's presentations of his poetry have been enthusiastically received coast-to-coast. His is a startlingly fresh, new, voice. Read this book.

Cornelia Hoogland, Professor, Faculty of Education, University of Western Ontario

Of Place and Memory will appeal to scholars and educators in education and creative writing and the social sciences, but it will also appeal to readers who are not part of academic circles. The book can be read as a collection of poems that sing out in a sustained and engaging voice, or it can be read as an insightful discussion of research methodologies in the social sciences, or it can be read as an engaging memoir that touches the imagination and heart, or it can be read as the moving testimony of a gay educator who has lived his whole life in the haunting and holy pursuit of language and literacy as democratic and just. It can be read in numerous ways, but it cannot be ignored. John J. Guiney Yallop has composed a compelling book that, by its creative contravention of cliché and convention, calls us together to critical conversation. This book is a singular gift!

Carl Leggo, Professor, Department of Language and Literacy Education, University of British Columbia.

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