LibGuides: Faculty Promotion & Tenure Books: 2019

BOOKS SELECTED BY 2019 HONOREES

Click on a title to view catalog record and digital bookplate. Click here to browse a list of all selections back to 2015.

Selected by Bhuiyan Alam

Suburban Nation: The Rise of Sprawl and the Decline of the American Dream by Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, Jeff Speck
Call Number: HT384.U5 D83 2010
"This book has fundamentally influenced my understanding of postwar American city planning and its negative impacts on all aspects of our lives. It not only harshly criticizes suburbanization of our cities but also suggests solutions to such a wicked problem. With much wit, Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, and Jeff Speck have wonderfully explained the flaws of car-centric postwar city planning, vouched for an end to sprawling our cities, and started the New Urbanism movement to return to more traditional city planning that vies for dense, mixed-use, walkable, and bike-able neighborhoods. The book details strategies that can help develop cities that are economically feasible, environmentally sound, aesthetically beautiful, safe to maneuver, and sustainable in nature. The book is as appealing and compelling as The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs, which is also a critique of bad planning that occurred in cities across America after the Second World War.”

Bhuiyan Alam, Ph.D.
College of Arts & Letters
Department of Geography & Planning
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Marcelo Alvarado-Vargas

The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail by Clayton M. Christensen
Call Number: HD53 .C49 2016
“Is it possible for well-established firms to face difficult times and face bankruptcy? Well, the book not only affirms that there is a possibility for them to face difficulties, but eventually the majority of great firms will fail because they do everything right ('do not fix it if it ain't broken'). Innovation and new technologies explain the departure of many great firms from the marketplace; thus, firms must embrace innovation as part of their business models despite its high risk of failure. There it is! ... a true dilemma.”

Marcelo Alverado-Vargas, Ph.D.
College of Business & Innovation
Department of Management
Promoted to Associate Professor & Granted Tenure, 2019

Selected by Alessandro Arsie

Differential Forms in Algebraic Topology by Raoul Bott & Loring W. Tu
Call Number: QA613.6 .B67 1982 c.2
“This is a lovely introduction to some of the main ideas of contemporary homotopy and cohomology theory, with a focus on concreteness, motivation, and readability. I read it as an undergraduate student back in Italy, and it was eye opening for my immediate interests (at that time geometric aspects of semi-classical mechanics) and for opening a vista to the amazing edifice of contemporary algebraic topology. ”

Alessandro Arsie, Ph.D.
College of Natural Sciences & Mathematics
Department of Mathematics & Statistics
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Richard Baron

Classical Myth by Barry B. Powell
Call Number: BL723 .P68 2015
“This book is important to me because I have been interested in mythology since childhood.”

Richard Baron, M.A.
College of Medicine & Life Sciences
Department of Psychiatry
Promoted to Associate Professor, 2019

Selected by Patricia Case

The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life by Erving Goffman
Call Number: HM291 .G63 1959
“I always enjoyed watching people, even as a young child. Their interactions amused, amazed and entertained me. When I first read this book, I was in a required undergraduate sociology class that I had dreaded taking as a part of my general education. Goffman's discussions of role playing and social scripts, for the first time, gave me an analytical framework to explain those interactions I'd been watching my entire life. It made me realize that I was an interactionist scholar. I changed my major to Sociology and never looked back. My career has been built on exploring how these interactions frame our social and personal outcomes for better or worse. As a woman born to a poor family with little to no education, it helped me navigate the unknown terrain of higher education and succeed.”

Patricia Case, Ph.D.
College of Arts & Letters
Department of Sociology & Anthropology
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Wendy Cochrane

Solving Discipline Problems: Strategies for Classroom Teachers by Charles H. Wolfgang & Carl D. Glickman
Call Number: LB3013 .W62 1986
“Dr. Glenn Carlton, my internship supervisor and life-long mentor, shared this book with me in 1994. It had a profound effect on me personally and professionally. After reading it, I understood why the methods I used to manage behavior in my classroom during the two years I was an elementary teacher did not work. It also is a perfect example of how school psychologists give away school psychology, which was the impetus for me entering the profession of school psychology, pursuing my PhD, and becoming a school psychology trainer.”

Wendy Cochrane, Ph.D.
College of Health & Human Services
School of Intervention & Wellness
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Matthew Franchetti

The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness by Stephen R. Covey
Call Number: BF637.S4 C685 2004
“This book was given to me by former UToledo College of Engineering Dean Nagi Naganathan when I started as the Associate Chair for the Mechanical, Industrial, and Mechanical Engineering Department. I had previously read The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change by the same author many years prior. This book offered many lessons and tools, regarding mindset changes, to create a highly fulfilling and meaningful personal and professional life. I still use many of the lessons today and recommend this book to anyone looking to improve the quality and meaningfulness of his or her life.”

Matthew Franchetti, Ph.D.
College of Engineering
Department of Mechanical, Industrial & Manufacturing Engineering
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Anu Garg

Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande
Call Number: R726.8 .G39 2017
“This book brings attention to how medical professionals are busy trying to find a cure for every illness and recommends they shift their focus on quality of life and living better with aging. It reminds me of the work I do as a geriatrician and as a hospice and palliative medicine doctor. It constantly validates that we are doing important work in medicine by bringing patients an opportunity to live a meaningful life and have a dignified end.”

Anu Garg, Ph.D.
College of Medicine & Life Sciences
Department of Internal Medicine
Promoted to Associate Professor, 2019

Selected by John Gray

The Eighth Day of Creation by Horace Freeland Judson
Call Number: QH506 .J83 1996
ISBN: 9780879694784
“This book is a history of the scientists whose work founded the modern era of molecular biology – from those who discovered the structure of DNA, those who cracked the genetic code, and those who figured out how genes are turned on and off inside living cells. I read this book as a Ph.D. student at Purdue University, and I have never forgotten how their curiosity and drive to understand the living world – sometimes despite overwhelming odds and pressures – led them to make pivotal discoveries. Their example is both humbling and energizing at the same time.”

John Gray, Ph.D.
College of Natural Sciences & Mathematics
Department of Biological Sciences
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Melissa Gregory

David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
Call Number: PR4558.A2 B87 2016
“When I was seven, my father read Charles Dickens’s David Copperfield to me aloud, parceling it out over months of bedtimes. My father’s personal history of extreme childhood poverty and abuse made him identify with the orphaned David, and he read the novel with great feeling, doing – as another Dickens character remarks – ‘all the voices.’ Although I didn’t realize it at the time, this experience taught me the many pleasures of reading: the emotional high of feeling deeply for people who aren’t real, the excitement of a good plot veering round the bend, the profound satisfaction of total cognitive absorption over a long period of time. Perhaps it isn’t surprising that I wound up in graduate school in English or that the University of Toledo ultimately hired me as a professor specializing in nineteenth-century British literature. Just as my father’s life was transformed by the novels he discovered at the public library, the course of my own life has been irrevocably shaped by literature.”

Melissa Gregory, Ph.D.
College of Arts & Letters
Department of English Language & Literature
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by F. Scott Hall

The Voyage of the Beagle by Charles Darwin
Call Number: QH11 .D2 1989
“I grew up in San Diego, initially wanting to be a zoologist (the San Diego Zoo was my second home), but more than that, I wanted to be Charles Darwin, uncovering the mysteries of nature and the origins of life as he traveled the world on the Beagle. Alas, I was born too late for those days of discovery, but I also realized that Darwin’s greatest discoveries were made in his mind, as he walked about the gardens of Down House. I work in a different age where the mysteries of life are revealed more by experimentation than observation, but despite that difference, I think that discoveries are still made in the minds of people that ponder great questions more than anywhere else, a truth that we have forgotten as technology has advanced and entranced us with its possibilities.”

F. Scott Hall, Ph.D.
College of Pharmacy & Pharmaceutical Sciences
Department of Pharmacology & Experimental Therapeutics
Promoted to Associate Professor & Granted Tenure, 2019

Selected by Lee Heritage

Final Alice
Call Number: M1613.D31 F56 1982
“I have chosen a musical score which has been influential for my career. David Del Tredici became famous in the classical music world during the 1970s when he wrote a series of symphonic tone poems based on Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland. The first one I heard was Final Alice, which ironically became the penultimate work in the series. I was immediately intrigued by Del Tredici’s juxtaposition of tonal and atonal harmonic languages, his imaginative setting of Carroll’s story, and his lovely interspersing of captivating child-like melodies. This music stirred my imagination for years and continues to be a magical, influential work for me. I revel not only in the majesty and excitement of his melodies and orchestration, but the joy expressed in this exuberant work. As David once said to me, ‘Tonality lives!’ ”

Lee Heritage, Ph.D.
College of Arts & Letters
Department of Music
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Bryan Lammon

Garner on Language and Writing by Bryan A. Garner
Call Number: KF250 .G376 2009
"Shortly after graduating from law school, I realized two things: (1) most lawyers write poorly, and (2) my writing looked a lot like that of most lawyers. Ever since then, as both a lawyer and an academic, I've worked to improve as a writer. Garner on Language and Writing is the first book on writing that I remember buying. This collection of speeches and essays inspired my philosophy for everything that I write: keep it short, make it clear, and simplify."

Bryan Lammon, J.D.
College of Law
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Dragan Isailovic

MALDI MS: A Practical Guide to Instrumentation, Methods, and Applications by Franz Hillenkamp & Jasna Peter-Katalinic
Call Number: QC454.M3 M353 2014
“This book is about Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/Ionization Mass Spectrometry (MALDI-MS), which is a remarkable analytical technique that is widely used for the quick and sensitive analyses of biomolecules, synthetic polymers, and other complex molecules in various samples. Professor Hillenkamp was one of the inventors of MALDI-MS in the 1980s. Along with Professor Peter-Katalinic, and other contributors, he did a great job in describing the theory and applications of MALDI-MS. The book is both educational and enjoyable with many excellent illustrations about MALDI-MS sample preparation and instrumentation. It is a masterpiece and an excellent read for generations of scientists interested in using MALDI-MS.”

Dragan Isailovic, Ph.D.
College of Natural Sciences & Mathematics
Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Yakov Lapitsky

You Can't Go Home Again by Thomas Wolfe
Call Number: LB3013 .W62 1986
“This novel is about a young man who moves away from his loved ones to pursue a career as a writer. Despite his initial success, he is uncertain about the value of his work, and simultaneously, wrestles with the realization that he can no longer fully return to the life he left behind. Reading this book in graduate school helped me overcome similar struggles while cutting my teeth in research, and for the first time, living far away from home.”

Yakov Lapitsky, Ph.D.
College of Engineering
Department of Chemical Engineering
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Trieu Le

Principles of Mathematical Analysis by Walter Rudin
Call Number: QA300 .R8 1976
“This is one of my all-time favorites. Among other things, the book provides a rigorous treatment of calculus theorems that most students are familiar with. It was difficult for me reading this the first time, but Rudin's elegant and superb presentation has shown me that a mathematics book can be as enjoyable as an interesting novel.”

Trieu Le, Ph.D.
College of Natural Sciences & Mathematics
Department of Mathematics & Statistics
Promoted to Associate Professor & Granted Tenure, 2019

Selected by Luis Mata

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
Call Number: PQ2226 .A33 2009
“I’ve read The Count of Monte Cristo at least three times. I have not found any book in which the story, characters and circumstances reach our emotions as Dumas does in his classic novel. If you have not read this book, go ahead and pick it up right now, and if you have, pick it up and read it again. You won’t be sorry.”

Luis Mata, Ph.D.
College of Engineering
Department of Engineering Technology
Promoted to Associate Professor & Granted Tenure, 2019

Selected by Iryna Pentina

The Marriage of Figaro by Pierre-Augustin de Beaumarchais
Call Number: PQ1956.A7 M3713 2014
“Following the advice of the great Russian poet Alexander Pushkin, who said ‘When uneasy thoughts come your way, uncork a bottle of Champagne or re-read the Marriage of Figaro,' I found inspiration in the ingenious main character of the comedy. Especially appealing to me was his monologue challenging Count Almaviva. It resonated with my personal and professional life experiences and encouraged me to persevere: ‘Nobility, fortune, rank, position! How proud they make a man feel! What have you done to deserve such advantages? Put yourself to the trouble of being born—nothing more. For the rest—a very ordinary man! Whereas I, lost among the obscure crowd, have had to deploy more knowledge, more calculation and skill merely to survive than has sufficed to rule all the provinces of Spain for a century!’ ”

Iryna Pentina, Ph.D.
College of Business & Innovation
Department of Marketing & International Business
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Zahoor Shah

Curfewed Night by Basharat Peer
ISBN: 9781439109113
“Curfewed Night narrates the harrowing picture of turmoil in Indian occupied Kashmir. The era when I was a teenager trying to carve my niche and find my way out to become a researcher. The book narrates the story of a budding writer who, like me, had to face hurdles to attend college.”

Zahoor Shah, Ph.D.
College of Pharmacy & Pharmaceutical Sciences
Department of Medicinal & Biological Chemistry
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Jiunn-Jye Sheu

En Route (Lutu Shang) by Qizheng Xu (Chicheng Hsu)
Call Number: PL2862 .U1417 E5 2014
“My father is a poet, a writer, and a literature contributor. He has published 28 books, in addition to two books that include a series of analysis on his writings. He received three honorary doctoral degrees in Literature and Humanities and was nominated for 2014 Nobel Prize in Literature. His tireless attitudes and continuous publications remind me of the aim of the Nobel Prize since adolescence.”

Jiunn-Jye Sheu, Ph.D.
College of Health & Human Services
School of Population Health
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Shipra Singh

Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present by Harriet A. Washington
Call Number: R853.H8 W37 2008
“I went to medical school at the age of 18 years and was in deep awe of the wonderful and amazing advancement of science. Much later in life, I came across this book that opened my eyes to the path of how these advancements were initially achieved. From the era of slavery to the present day, this book presents a historical account of black Americans' mistreatment as unwitting subjects of medical experimentation. This book influenced the development of my research interest on health disparities and social determinants of health. It also motivated me to look at strategies to address factors impacting health outcome disparity at the health-system level.”

Shipra Singh, Ph.D.
College of Health & Human Services
School of Population Health
Promoted to Associate Professor & Granted Tenure, 2019

Selected by Heather Sloane

The White Death: A History of Tuberculosis by Thomas Dormandy
Call Number: RC311 .D67 2000
“I read so many amazing books for my dissertation research in my pursuit to better understand how myths of poverty are constructed in medical education. But this is the book I wish I had written. Dormandy's writing is such a beautiful blend of shining a light on the importance of artists and the study of cultural history, social science, and medicine. It is a multidisciplinary wonder. The book is written with empathy about an illness we no longer fear in the US that ravaged communities. The White Death is the example I set out in front of me that I will continually strive to duplicate with my own voice and very different social justice concerns.”

Heather Sloane, Ph.D.
College of Health & Human Services
School of Social Justice
Promoted to Associate Professor & Granted Tenure, 2019

Selected by Kasey Tucker-Gail

Teaching...Is a Learning Experience: A For Better or Worse Collection by Lynn Johnston
Call Number: PN6728.F6 J6748 2007
“The author, Lynn Johnston, is from my hometown area. I grew up reading her comic strips weekly in the paper and own a signed collection of her work. Through her work, I essentially watched her turn normal family experiences into something funny and poignant. What is great about her characters is that they grow, learn, experience life, and never stood still- just like the rest of us, they were relatable. The title of this particular collection is Teaching is a Learning Experience! and this statement rings true to any academic. Every new class, paper, presentation or research project is both a teaching and learning experience. Lynn Johnston was also an example for me as a young child. She was from a small town but managed to emerge as one of the most recognized female Canadians of her time. She has the world’s most popular comic strip and has been awarded numerous accolades, including the Order of Canada and a star on Canada’s Walk of Fame. She was an example to me as a young child that my opportunities were limitless.”

Kasey Tucker-Gail, J.D., Ph.D.
College of Health & Human Services
School of Social Justice
Promoted to Professor, 2019

Selected by Amit Tiwari

How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie
Call Number: BF637.S8 C37 2009
Amit Tawari, Ph.D.
College of Pharmacy & Pharmaceutical Sciences
Department of Pharmacology & Experimental Therapeutics
Promoted to Associate Professor & Granted Tenure, 2019

Selected by Hong Wang

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
Call Number: PS1306 .A1 2014
"Many books have been influential to my life. I highly enjoyed reading this book as a child. Tom’s exciting outdoor adventure was written with a great sense of humor. Life itself is an adventure, and I hope everyone enjoys it.”

Hong Wang, Ph.D.
College of Engineering
Department of Engineering Technology
Promoted to Professor, 2019