CCNY faculty publish a range of new books

Faculty from The City College of New York have published a range of new books. The titles are diverse non-fiction books about film, Spanish culture, immigration, bilingual languages, as well as memoirs that are poignant, instructive, and humorous.
 
The list is as follows:
 
Martin Woessner, a professor of history and society in the Division of Interdisciplinary Studies at the Center for Worker Education, recently released "Terrence Malick and the Examined Life." The book is the most comprehensive account of celebrated filmmaker Terrence Malick’s (“Days of Heaven,” “Thin Red Line,” “A Hidden Life”) oeuvre. "Library Journal" calls Woessner’s writing “perceptive” and “well-cited.” "Publisher’s Weekly" describes the book as “erudite” and “essential reading” for Malick fans. Woessner was recently interviewed on the CUNY Academy for the Humanities and the Sciences "Book Talks." 

Professor Isabel Estrada has written a new book “Democrazy in Spain: Cinema and New Forms of Social Life (1968-2008).” Estrada’s expertise is in Iberian and Latin American cultures. Her book discusses the convergences in Spain, through the film industry, of two markedly significant periods in two separate centuries: the protests prompted by the 2008 financial crisis and the 1968 protests. Estrada is in the Classical and Modern Languages Department of the Division of Humanities and the Arts, and also affiliated with the Media and Communication Arts Program.

In “From Homemakers to Breadwinners to Community Leaders,” Norma Fuentes-Mayorga compares the immigration and integration experiences of Dominican and Mexican women in New York City, a traditional destination for Dominicans but a relatively new one for Mexicans. Her book documents the significance of women-led migration within an increasingly racialized context and underscores the contributions women make to their communities of origin and of settlement. Fuentes-Mayorga's research is timely, especially against the backdrop of policy debates about the future of family reunification laws and the unprecedented immigration of women and minors from Latin America, many of whom seek human rights protection or to reunite with families in the US. She is program director of Sociology in the Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership.
 
"Lessons from a Dual Language Bilingual School: Celebrando una década de Dos Puentes Elementary" is co-edited by the School of Education’s Bilingual Education and TESOL Professor Tatyana Kleyn. A co-founder of the fully bilingual Dos Puentes Elementary School in New York City, the book reflects on the first 10 years of the school, showcasing the lessons, successes and challenges they faced. Chapter authors include families, teachers, school administrators and university partners, highlighting key moments in the life of the school, with researcher commentary for context. Kleyn is also Principal Investigator for the City University of New York - Initiative on Immigration and Education (CUNY-IIE), has written numerous books, articles and films on bilingual education, translanguaging and immigration.
 
The comic memoir “Firsthand: How I Solved a Literary Mystery and Learned to Play Kickass Tennis while Coming to Grips with the Disorder of Things”, was published by Professor Keith Gandal, who has a Joint Appointment in Creative Writing and American Studies in the English Department of the Division of Humanities and the Arts, and affiliated with the MFA in Creative Writing program. “Firsthand” combines a scholarly detective story with a comic midlife crisis. Gandal, while researching how Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Faulkner faced their forgotten crises of masculinity, discovers that his own crisis is instrumental to his creative process. He incorporates stories from his foray into the hyper-competitive world of middle-aged men’s tennis, pitbulls, and Michel Foucault, while giving readers guidance on affirming self-knowledge, historical fact-finding, and the world-at-large. An excerpt was published on LitHub.
 
Author and Professor Emily Raboteau released her memoir, "Lessons for Survival: Mothering Against 'the Apocalypse'" to great acclaim. She has been lauded in the "New York Times" and profiled in the "LA Times," while her work has appeared in "The New York Review of Books," and "The Atlantic." Provocative and innovative, Raboteau's writing confronts the myriad, multiplying dangers, that constitute life in the 21st century, at the intersections of social, racial, and environmental justice, through the lens of motherhood. Her book is a moving exploration of what it takes to raise thriving children in a world of inequities, without coming undone yourself. Raboteau is in the Black Studies Department and affiliated with the MFA in Creative Writing program.
 
Author Salar Abdoh’s novel “A Nearby Country called Love” was shortlisted for the 2024 William Sorayan International Prize for Writing. Abdoh is a professor, English Department deputy chair, and director of Undergraduate Creative Writing, as well as affiliated with the MFA in Creative Writing. It is a sweeping, propulsive novel about the families we are born into and the families we make for ourselves, in which a man struggles to find his place in an Iran on the brink of combusting. Originally born in Iran, his translations in the book “Women Life Freedom: Voices and Art from the Women’s Protests in Iran” were shortlisted for the United Kingdom’s The Bread and Roses Award for Radical Publishing.