Announcing the 2008-2009 CORE Book

A Long Way Gone
by Ishmael Beah

 
Ishmael Beah grew up in Sierra Leone, Africa, living a very simple, unremarkable and happy life.   He went to the river to fetch water in the morning, bathed in the river, and went to school, playing soccer afterwards.

At the age of 12, Ishmael’s life was turned upside down when civil war came to his village and claimed the lives of his family.  Because he lost everything, he joined a group of boys who wandered the countryside until they joined the government troops and became soldiers.  Ishmael lived a life handling AK-47 rifles and machetes. Often on drugs, he learned to kill.  A Long Way Gone is Ishmael’s first-hand account of his experience in the army. 

After three years of horrific fighting, Ishmael was handed over to UNICEF workers and taken to a rehabilitation center where he began to get his life back.  In the center, one of the things that people kept saying to him was ‘It’s not your fault.’  That was difficult because it made the life Ishmael had lived seem unimportant.   He needed to relearn to live a peaceful life, similar to any war veteran returning to civilian life.

Asked in an interview with Public Broadcasting commentator Jeffrey Brown if what happened to him could happen to anyone, Ishmael replied:  “It’s not specific to Africans or wherever there are civil wars.  If you’re there, you never know how you will react.  We all have that capability.”

Here is a link to an interview with the author: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/entertainment/jan-june07/beah_04-05.html

Classes for which A Long Way Gone would be appropriate include but are not limited to:

Human Growth and Development, Mental Health, Sociology, Psychology, World Geography, Ethics, Philosophy, Successful Learning and Speech.

A faculty study guide is available.  Please contact Colleen Peltz if you would like a copy.

Other colleges and universities using A Long Way Gone for First Year Experience or Core Courses include: Syracuse University, Valparaiso University, Roger Williams University, University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh,  and University of North Carolina at Greensboro. 

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