2012-2013 In/common
The Cultural and Intellectual Climate Committee is pleased to announce two books that will be our common read for 2012-2013: The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot. Both books raise questions about our common humanity (across the globe, across ethnic and socio-economic divides). They focus our attention on the dangers of dehumanization and social inequality. How do we engage with people of different classes or ethnicities in a civil or ethical manner?
Common Sense
Common Law
Common Knowledge
Common Good
Common Use
Common Language
Common Ground
Common Bond
In/Common in the Classroom
Some members of the faculty using one of these books in their classrooms include Linda Rosekrans, Lorraine Berry, Ibipo Johnston-Anumonwo, John Aerni-Flessner, Kimberly Kraebel, and Deborah Rogers. If you are a member of the faculty and will be using The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks in your Spring 2013 classes, please let us know!
For more information, please contact Scott Moranda (scott.moranda@cortland.edu).
The Kite Runner
Kite Runner is the story of unusual friendship between a wealthy boy and the son of his father’s servant set against the background of war-ravaged Afghanistan. The novel also tells the boy’s story of emigration to the United States and his eventual return to his homeland.
Teaching Guide to the Kite Runner
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Issues of ethics, race, and medicine collide in the story of a poor black tobacco farmer whose cells – taken without her knowledge in 1951 – have proven vital in gene mapping, cloning, and the development of vaccines, generating millions of dollars of business unseen by Lacks or her family.