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Music Fundamentals 2: Rhythm and Meter

Contributors: Ewell and Schmidt-Jones

Publisher: OpenStax CNX

License: CC BY

This collection is the second of five dealing with the rudiments of music.

(6 reviews)

Sound Reasoning

Contributors: Brandt and McClure

Publisher: OpenStax CNX

License: CC BY

“Sound Reasoning” is a web-based, introductory music appreciation course. It offers a new approach to music appreciation for adults, focusing on style-independent concepts. While the course concentrates primarily on Western classical and modern music, the concepts that are introduced apply to music of any style or era. The goal of “Sound Reasoning” is to equip you with questions that you may ask of any piece of music, thereby creating a richer and more comprehensive understanding of music both familiar and unfamiliar. Here are some additional features of the course. 1) ”Sound Reasoning” is completely listening based. No ability to read music is required. 2) The course assumes little or no musical background. A minimum of terminology is invoked. 3) Musical examples are interpolated directly into the text. 4) The course is interactive. A “listening gallery” with exercises follows each module, so that you may practice and refine your listening skills. 5) The modules may be studied in sequence or individually. 6)You may easily print a .pdf of any module.. “Sound Reasoning” is designed as both a stand-alone, self-paced course as well as a supplement to existing university classes.

(7 reviews)

You, Writing! A Guide to College Composition

Contributors: Glynn, Hallsten-Erickson, and Swing

Publisher: Alexandra Glynn

License: CC BY-NC-SA

This text is meant to be used in any first year College Composition class or as a general guide to college writing. The book focuses on writing as a process, not a product. The goal is to help students discover their own writing process, tryin g out different methods and strategies to find what works best for them

(25 reviews)

Mapping, Society, and Technology

Contributor: Manson

Publisher: University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing

License: CC BY-NC

This book is about how to read, use, and create maps. Our exploration of maps will be informed by a contextual understanding of how maps reflect the relationship between society and technology, and how mapping is an essential form of scientific and artistic inquiry. We will also explore how mapping is used to address a variety of societal issues, such as land use planning and political gerrymandering. You will gain insight into the technical underpinnings of mapping as a science approach, complement on-going interest and activities, or provide an applied focus for research or policy.

(3 reviews)

Words of Wisdom: Intro to Philosophy

Contributor: Ondich

Publisher: Jody Ondich

License: CC BY-NC-SA

Words of Wisdom can come from anyone. In this text we discuss topics ranging from "Are Humans good by nature?" to "Is there a God?" to "Do I have the right to my own opinion?" Philosophy is the study of wisdom, and can emerge in our conversations in social media, in school, around the family dinner table, and even in the car. The text uses materials that are 2,500 years old, and materials that were in the news this year. Wise people come in all shapes and types, and from every culture on earth. We have poetry and folktales, sacred writings and letters. Dialogues and interviews, news columns, Ted Talks, You Tube recordings and even comedy are all a part of the content in this text.You will be most successful reading this on line. The formatting in the downloadable versions is not wonderful. There is work being done by the software, but in the meantime, you will want to use it by clicking here on "read book:".

(4 reviews)

Analyzing meaning: An introduction to semantics and pragmatics

Contributor: Kroeger

Publisher: Language Science Press

License: CC BY

This book provides an introduction to the study of meaning in human language, from a linguistic perspective. It covers a fairly broad range of topics, including lexical semantics, compositional semantics, and pragmatics. The chapters are organized into six units: (1) Foundational concepts; (2) Word meanings; (3) Implicature (including indirect speech acts); (4) Compositional semantics; (5) Modals, conditionals, and causation; (6) Tense & aspect.

(1 review)

College ESL Writers: Applied Grammar and Composing Strategies for Success

Contributors: Hall and Wallace

Publisher: University System of Georgia

License: CC BY-NC-SA

College ESL Writers: Applied Grammar and Composing Strategies for Success is designed as a comprehensive grammar and writing etext for high intermediate and advanced level non-native speakers of English. We open the text with a discussion on the sentence and then break it down into its elemental components, before reconstructing them into effective sentences with paragraphs and larger academic assignments. Following that, we provide instruction in paragraph and essay writing with several opportunities to both review the fundamentals as well as to demonstrate mastery and move on to more challenging assignments.

(10 reviews)

Keys to Understanding the Middle East

Contributors: Payind and McClimans

Publisher: The Ohio State University Pressbooks

License: CC BY-SA

This book is intended for readers who have never studied the Middle East, or experts who may wish to fill gaps in their knowledge of the region from other disciplines. Whether for establishing or deepening one's knowledge of the region, these fundamentals are important to know. The languages, cultural, religious and sectarian communities of the region, and selected turning points and influential people in history are starting points for gaining an understanding of the diverse contexts of the region. It isbased on introductoryand graduatecourseson thecontemporaryMiddle East, which the Center's director, Dr. Alam Payind, has been teaching for the past 30 years. The book's co-author,Melinda McClimans,hastaught these and other courses with him, as well as her own,for the past 15years. The material isintendedengage with diverse – even conflicting – culturaland historicalperspectives,andways of perceivingboth Middle Easternandworld historyfrom perspectives within the region. It is not intended to reinforce a monolithic or matter-of-fact perception of the region.For this and many other reasons, images are an important aspect of the knowledge presented. Each chapter starts with links to its image galleries, along with other visual aids and key elements.

(9 reviews)

Naming the Unnameable: An Approach to Poetry for New Generations

Contributor: Evory

Publisher: Open SUNY

License: CC BY-NC-SA

Informed by a writing philosophy that values both spontaneity and discipline, Michelle Bonczek Evory's Naming the Unnameable: An Approach to Poetry for New Generations offers practical advice and strategies for developing a writing process that is centered on play and supported by an understanding of America's rich literary traditions. With consideration to the psychology of invention, Bonczek Evory provides students with exercises aimed to make writing in its early stages a form of play that gives way to more enriching insights through revision, embracing the writing of poetry as both a love of language and a tool that enables us to explore ourselves and better understand the world. The volume includes resources for students seeking to publish and build a writing-centered lifestyle or career. Poets featured range in age, subject, and style, and many are connected to colleges in the State University of New York system. Naming the Unnameable promotes an understanding of poetry as a living art of which students are a part, and provides ways for students to involve themselves in the growing contemporary poetry community that thrives in America today.

(17 reviews)

Six Ways of Being Religious

Contributor: Cannon

Publisher: Wadsworth Publishing Company

License: CC BY-NC

The book proposes the hypothesis that six generic ways of being religious may be found in any large-scale religious tradition such as Christianity or Buddhism or Islam or Hinduism: sacred rite, right action, devotion, shamanic mediation, mystical quest, and reasoned inquiry. These are recurrent ways in which, socially and individually, devout members of these traditions take up and appropriate their stories and symbols in order to draw near to, and come into right relationship with, what the traditions attest to be the ultimate reality.

(7 reviews)