Book?
 

Well to pass the time, I was thinking about maybe starting writing a book about this whole issue. I am sure that the idea has been mentioned here and there but nothing has come out of it. This book would need to be coauthored, no doubt. In it, I want the focus to be on the history of immigrant students in the US in the recent past up to the present day. Statistics would definitely play a role on it as well as awareness about what the DREAM Act is exactly. (Also a comprehensive history of the DREAM Act would be essential, especially for future historians!).

I have a title in mind... Till We Have Faces: The Plight of Undocumented Students in the United States

Suggestions? Comments? I need feedback! :)

Does anyone know who would be interested in co-authoring it and hopefully trying to sell if to publishers? How about a stay at home mom/dad who's kids go to school during the day with great writing skills? We need a "project leader" who has the time to devote to this. Anyone?

I'd be willing to co- author/ publish/ ... etc... will talk to my professor about the process...

I think this is a great idea. I'd be willing to help.

i can help if needed/wanted.

I can definitely help.

The main problems would be of scope, length, publishing time. Obviously if it's a 800 page book there's no way it could come out in the next two years. On the other hand a 200 page book may seem too short.

What we need is an author who has written on the issue. I don't even mean about immigration but how about someone writing about women's rights or African-Americans. We would have to contact that person and say we already have all the research for him/her (our stories) and all we need them to do is to write it nicely and get it published.

Does anyone read this kind of literature and know of any authors who haven't written anything in a while?

Just looking at my bookshelf I see Sally Jenkins co-authored Lance Armstrong's book on overcoming cancer, Joan Dash wrote about women fighting for their rights by striking, Dinesh D'Souza a conservative writers who often talks about the need for merit in the American system.

How about a politician? People like Tancredo has published his own book on illegal immigration... so how about either Rep. Gutierrez or Senator Durbin? I am sure that it would sell because they are well known. All they need is people like us to do the research for them and heck even help write it out... I am sure with Rep. Gutierrez that he could get nice coverage by Univision and stuff... so how about it?

I am going to see what I can do
 

It is going to take some time though. I am going to write to a couple of people and see what they can tell me. I know a prof. just published a book about undocumented immigration. You might still need a prof. to lend his/her name to the issue. It could make it faster if people from this site wrote a little piece about themselves and then you wrote an essay about the history/relevance of the issue. You can also divided the thing by chapters and have each person write a chapter. J6 can write about the economic benefits because he has a finance background. Hopefuldreamer can write about he political aspect because she has a political science factor. I am pretty sure we can get a psychological aspect and a moral, legal, historical aspect. That would be faster and since it is a copilation, it does not have to match the style of every person. I am not going to be able to log or check this site until Wed. So think about it and give me some feedback.

P.S.
Hell, we even have people capable of making the cover and take pictures that fit with the subject!

I say assign chapters to a group of committed people. For example, one group can cover the history of the DREAM Act, another the politics behind it, etc. I like the idea.

We need to assign committees... we need more people who genuinely want to help.

Sem Moreno has already published a small publications with stories. We can use that for the "stories" part of the book.

^There is a substantial problem with different people writing different parts and that is style. The reason people hire authors to tell their stories is to have a uniform tone throughout a publication. You won't get that if we all do separate parts since we have widely differing writing skills. Additionally I don't think anyone here actually writes well enough to be published. Some may write good 10 page papers but it's a different story when you have to deal with 400 pages of arguments.

I could write an economic analysis but it's hardly going to be understandable to the average person. If you jump from that to a chapter on the struggles of life the book won't be very cohesive.

What you want is one uniform story even if it has to be fictional. One character could incorporate all our experiences and convey our more technical arguments in their own voice in the story. For example "John" could be making an economic argument when trying to convince someone to give him a chance. In other words I think a narrative of a character that is essentially all of us together would be inspired by true stories and in that aspect dramatic enough for publication and also would avoid all the issues with just writing about all of us separately.