Book Reviews 997 also acknowledge the historical marginalization of “othered” voices and the roots of cancel culture within marginalized communities. The text is strongest when it offers reflection and lesson prompts. Contributed reflec- tions are more focused and provide concrete examples from a range of experiences. Take for instance Nicole A. Cooke’s discussion of misinformation and disinformation, which advocates for a “critical cultural literacy” that “fuses cultural competence with…historical literacy, racial literacy, emotional literacy, and social justice” (23). Her approach enables conversations be- tween educators and students to acknowledge societal and historical inequities that contribute to the creation of dis/misinformation as well as offer building blocks to quickly recognize and combat dis/misinformation. Pair this with the excellent lesson plan offered by Kathleen Currie Smith, which teaches students how to investigate the bias and framing narratives journalists and news outlets use for their stories, and you have a ready-made lesson on recognizing media bias. Another great example of this type of pairing is offered in chapter 6. Blake Goble, Pam Goble, and Ryan Goble offer a reflection and a lesson plan that both focus on incorporating popular culture into the classroom. As they astutely point out, educators “can use pop texts to help students move beyond binaries while cultivating more civil, cooperative, compassion- ate, and just communities” (73). They offer practical suggestions on how to handle historical inaccuracies and strategies for teaching critical perspectives on the capitalist nature of media companies while also celebrating culture that students and educators alike enjoy and consume. In addition, appendix C offers a great overview of the online repository Critical Media Project, which I would recommend over the small appendix B offered in the book itself. Overall, this book is helpful in addressing practical classroom strategies but lacks suffi- cient engagement with critical media theory and the rich scholarly conversation that is ongo- ing in the field. Clearly media literacy and social justice is a topic educators care about and are ready to discuss. By offering ten chapters written by a slate of twenty contributors from a wide range of backgrounds, Media Literacy for Justice is one place to get started. — Hannah Cole, Cal Poly Pomona Note 1. The Objective et al., “A More Specific Letter on Justice and Open Debate,” The Objective, July 10, 2020, objectivejournalism.org/2020/07/a-more-specific-letter-on-justice-and-open-debate/. Embracing Change: Alternatives to Traditional Research Writing Assignments. Silke Higgins and Ngoc-Yen Tran, eds. Chicago: Association of College and Research Libraries, 2022. 319 p. Paper, $86.00 (978-0-8389-3766-2). Amidst a competitive job market, a constantly evolving digital sphere of communication, and the many pressures (ecological, economic, and otherwise) facing students upon graduation, academic institutions are charged with the task of best preparing students to thrive. Embracing Change: Alternatives to Traditional Research Writing Assignments meets this challenge by inspiring information literacy instructors to consider their unique student populations and their corresponding needs; to be open- minded regarding resources available; and, above all, to be creative and nuanced in moving past written essays and reports toward assignments that better reflect student learning. http://objectivejournalism.org/2020/07/a-more-specific-letter-on-justice-and-open-debate/ 998 College & Research Libraries November 2023 Embracing Change is organized in two parts. Part 1, “Analog-Driven Assignments,” con- tains chapters on topics such as voter guides, museum exhibits, letterpress poetry, zines, finding aids, and children’s books. Part 2, “Technology-Driven Assignments,” covers Wiki- pedia Edit-a-thons, infographics and lightning talk videos, podcasts, and digital humanities projects. Instruction and course types range from tens to hundreds of students, use a variety of grading scales (e.g., pass/fail, “labor-based grading contracts,” ungrading), and they in- volve faculty across a spectrum of academic pursuits and levels. The format of each chapter is easy to follow. Authors report on the context of their institutions and classes, followed by the explicit details of their course and assignments, along with a mix of feedback from their own perspectives as well as from their students. Though the primary audience for this book is instructional librarians, some chapters may also be helpful to units such as digital humanities and archives that engage in instruction with special collections. Additionally, this book would be an asset beyond the library to research and inquiry instructors, as well as curricula support, writing center, or student success staff. The editors are well positioned to have shepherded this volume through production. Hig- gins is a research and instructional librarian working with non-traditional students and English language learners, both examples of students who may benefit from alternatives to the written assignment model. Tran’s role as a coordinator for teaching and learning coupled with a focus on high-impact educational practices is evident in the selection of ideas presented in the book. The contributing authors mainly comprise instructional, liaison, and student success type librarian roles, featuring some input from faculty members and curricula support as well. This range of authors testifies to the applicability of the ideas of this book to librarians and instructors, as well as to readers from a wide variety of academic domains and institutions whose students could all benefit from the ideas in this text. A key strength of Embracing Change is its learner-focused format. Although some chap- ters and assignments are geared toward an entire research course or an embedded model of information literacy instruction, most can be adapted to fit the purposes of one-shot instruc- tion. Chapter 8, “Remembering Local Mexican American History through Storytime,” goes beyond adapting assignments from one-shot instruction, suggesting instead collaboration with faculty for integrated information literacy instruction. The authors note that one-shot instruction is “shown to be potentially ineffective for student learning, and [is] considered a cause of librarian burnout, particularly for librarians of color and other marginalized groups” (132). Each chapter begins with a full description of the educational setting, contextualizing the institution, class, and constitution of the student body. This organization makes it clear how invested the authors are in understanding and catering to their students’ unique interests and needs. Since each chapter entails assignments that have already been implemented (and, in some cases, that have even gone through multiple iterations), the authors have benefitted from feedback (both personal and from students). Where possible, they share these experiences with the reader. Appendixes featuring course descriptions or assignment outlines are included in almost every chapter, and are valuable as instruction or clarification for adaptation. Even where assignments are entirely out of the realm of possibility for many reading this text (one requires a letterpress for printing), readers will be inspired by the dedication and processes of instructors who facilitate their students’ learning using grants, faculty collaboration, col- league expertise, or whatever other resources are available. Book Reviews 999 While Embracing Change achieves its goal in exploring alternatives to research writing assignments, the book’s brief introduction fails to introduce the ACRL Framework for Informa- tion Literacy, which many chapters reference. Given the applicability of Framework outside the scope of libraries (such as inquiry or research writing faculty, curricula support staff, or really any academic staff without an MLIS), it could have been a helpful gloss in the introduc- tion. Furthermore, given the brevity of the introduction, the editors missed an opportunity to ground their book and its contributions within the relevant discourse of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. But these are relatively minor concerns. Overall, readers of this text will gain an understanding of actionable ideas to inspire their own methodologies for modern information literacy instruction.—Nicole Doro, McMaster University Teaching Critical Reading Skills: Strategies for Academic Librarians. Hannah Gascho Rempel and Rachel Hamelers, eds. Chicago, IL: Association of College and Research Libraries, 2023. 2v. 256p. Paper, $120.00 (ISBN: 978-0-8389-3961-1). This two-volume set contains forty-five invited contributions that offer examples of how individual academic libraries are supporting the teach- ing of critical reading at their institutions. According to the editors, the project is inspired by the 2015 essay collection Critical Reading in Higher Education: Academic Goals and Social Engagement (Manarin, 2015), which “provided the theoretical basis for these volumes and helped us explore what critical reading could look like as practiced and interpreted by academic librarians” (v. 1, XIII). This theoretical basis for defining and understanding critical reading as adopted by Gascho Rempel and Hamelers is built on the notion that “reading has purpose.” In academia, therefore, there are two major forms of critical reading. One is disciplinary or academic reading, which features “learning to read in order to work, understand, or create new knowledge in a discipline.” The second is so- cially engaged reading, which involves the ability to “understand a different perspective, empathize with those whose experiences are different from [one’s] own, or create change in their community” (Ibid.). The structure of the set matches this theoretical framework. Volume 1 features twenty- four entries focused on disciplinary/academic critical reading, offering tips and examples for teaching students strategies and techniques for doing so. The second volume includes twenty-one additional entries covering socially engaged reading, offering methods and advice for how academic librarians can offer instruction in evaluating sources, critically assessing non-scholarly sources, and more broadly applying critical reading skills. Each entry includes descriptions of how the authors have taught critical reading skills in one form or another to their students, including guiding principles and copies of actual assess- ments administered to their classes. Topics in volume 1 include teaching critical assessment of primary sources and scholarly articles from disciplines as diverse as English, science, health, and engineering, as well as examples of teaching these skills to specific populations such as first-year students, transfer students, community college students, and at-risk students. Volume 2 offers similar examples for teaching students to evaluate sources as diverse as statistics, opinion polls, memes, images, media articles, and even graphic novels. Overall, this compilation will prove quite useful for academic librarians seeking new methods for