New titles range from monographs on hacktivism to language policy and literary studies
The University of Ottawa Press officially announced their fall 2019 and spring 2020 books this week with an event that featured president Jacques Frémont and members of the press’s board and editorial team.
The U of O Press is the university’s academic publishing arm, printing titles on a wide range of academic topics, by professors at the U of O and elsewhere. The Press is the only fully bilingual university press in Canada.
Press director Lara Mainville said that there are many titles this publishing season that are highly relevant to current society, such as Ethical Hacking on the timely topic of hacktivism, texts on shifting geopolitics in the Anthropocene (the current geological age of human influence on the environment), and studies of separatism and language policy.
The Press also publishes a large number of studies in general academic topics, including studies in Canadian literature, several monographs on Tolstoy, critical texts on education, and even a book about Leonard Cohen’s music, among countless other topics.
An academic press, said Frémont, is core to a university’s reputation and helps distribute valuable and cutting edge research.
“University presses for us have a great value for outreaching the academic work being done at the U of O,” said Frémont. “Books matter, research matters.”
Frémont highlighted the importance of the U of O Press as a bilingual press, providing an essential outlet for research on French-Canadian society and policy. Getting research out in French is vital to the U of O’s mandate, said Frémont.
Frémont’s decisive statement that “books are still important” elicited a round of applause from the audience. The Press, however, is expanding beyond physical books into open-access ebooks and audiobooks as well.
Mainville said that the Press has published more books this season than ever before.
