Talk:Textbook/Archive 1

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Archive 1

NPOV dispute

This article repeatedly accuses both students and professors of being completely uninformed about the textboox process, and why the price on these textbooks are so expensive. It seems to me that most students and expecially most professors are not nearly as moronic as this article makes them sound. It just seems like the article was written from a publisher's point of view.

This seems a bit sensational. Most textbooks are not $100, and many are available used. Perhaps this could be broken up to have a very informative NPOV section at the top talking about:

what a textbook is
how they are used in grade school, high school and college
who generally writes them (type of people, leading publishing houses, etc.)
the used textbook industry
how they differ outside the U.S., etc.

Then there could be a section called "Controversy" that talked about the various controversial issues (price, content, revisionism, professors promoting their own books, etc.). The price discussion would be better if both POV were represented (sure, there's price gouging, but textbooks are expensive to produce, so it's understandable that it's hard to make the economics work). The content discussion would benefit from some case/law references. --Meara 03:23, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Just for what it's worth, in my experience (as a current college student) most of my textbooks do indeed cost $100 or more if purchased new. Quandaryus 21:10, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I got a new copy of MIT's calculus book on amazon for $50, I believe it was New, but I'm not sure (in any case, it looked new and didn't seem to have been used). ugen64 00:42, Sep 16, 2004 (UTC)

I agree the pricing discussion is inappropriate in its current location. It doesn't really deserve more than a footnote somewhere, or perhaps a note that high prices are a leading cause of pursuing other avenues of disemminating information from teacher to student.

Perhaps a better way to deal with the pricing topic is to find some neutral data on the subject and simply present what goes into the cost of the average textbook. (i.e. 30% printing costs, 60% copyright licensing, 5% bookstore profit, 5% other) This would be more informative than the current approach, and you could just have a section about "What goes into the cost of a textbook?" or something.

The problem is that the only source for this data is the book stores and publishers themselves. They publish numbers, but they're obviously nonsense, pretending that they make 0% profit and that the entire cost to the consumer is justified by expenses: http://www.nacs.org/public/industry.asp —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.167.73.243 (talk) 21:06, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Writing a paper on textbook prices; it seems like this article doesn't flow at all. In the first paragraph it states "Many university students complain of unreasonably high textbook costs ... Since the 1980s, prices have risen much more rapidly than the rate of inflation[1], and many students feel that this represents price gouging on the part of the publisher" To be honest I had to read this section about three times before it clicked, it just appears contradictory. Also, worth mentioning that science books, and biology in particular, are the worst offenders for textbook pricing.

Below is the link to a Washington Post Article on textbook prices, in it a member of the National Assocaition of College Stores was quoted as saying that according to one of their recent studies that over 60% of US college students refuse to buy textbooks to help save money. Kind of scary.

[1]

Zidel333 16:01, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me that this article desparately needs to be rewritten. With full respect to the author, it is hard to read through you contradicting points of view. grab a notebook or palm pilet and go do research at universities. Ask students what they think of textbooks prices and give some of their quotes. ask professors about students not using cd's and websites and tell us what they say. i am in an economy class, and it is a new cource. the school board refused to buy textbooks, and so my teacher printed off this article so we could write an essay about the economicsof textbook buying. it was nearly impossible to find a firm belief about textbook prices because of the contradicting ideoligys. like i said, complete overhaul is nessisary.Dizzyizzy 19:10, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

UPDATE: school board bought books!!! 112 a book...

yes most books ARE over 100 dollars... :P Dizzyizzy

I started to edit this page into a non-bias format, but it is going to be a long process. This is like sorting through R. Kennedy assassination evidence.

There is a lot of information that is true, but presented falsely. They do only take 32% profit, but that is compared to the average return for any business of 2-20%.

I will come back to this when I get time and attempt to fix it.

134.39.114.194 22:52, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh one more thing, I deleted a link that was false. The NASC link about the "New Textbook Dollar" is false. Some one should contact NASC about this. I am currently passing a law through WA state legislation regarding book bundle consumer options and know for a fact that publishers do not spend any money to bookstore cost. Nor do the bookstores take nearly that much by any means if any money at all from text sales. Most bookstores make their money from state money for operations and the sales of additional items such as shirts and what not.

The average cost of a text book is $56 if you include the cost of supplemental materials. If you only count the actual texts themselves the average is $93. That is at a college level, the cost for K-12 is significantly higher. These do not include internet sales like half.com that sell you the Euro version of the book that is exactly the same only with a different code on it and a slightly less colorful cover.

Also, there are rarely actual authors of text books. Generally it is a team of indivduals who compile and rewrite data. This is not secret information, just go visit one of the publishing companies and ask to look around. They are not top-secret so you can do that. Some will even give you the tour.

I will get back to all this next chance I get.

134.39.114.194 23:13, 19 January 2007 (UTC) Bryan AJ Kennedy

Leave the link in, just make sure readers can deduce for themselves that it's propaganda. 71.167.73.243 (talk) 21:12, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

I attempted to make the inernational book section more neutral, as it seemed to be a publishers POV trying to persuade students not to buy international editions. --144.92.242.229 14:14, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Aquiring textbooks is very different for students here in Estonia. During my 6 years in the uni I have yet to hear somebody buying a textbook here. We always borrow them from libraries. But I have lived in France and the Netherlands and over there it is common that students buy and resell them (just like this article describes). I think this would be a nice point to address in the article, because it is interesting (isn't it?), but I can't find any accountable sources describing this issue, only local people acknowledging that nobody buys textbooks in Estonia... 193.40.12.44 (talk) 16:44, 30 March 2015 (UTC)

Bias Towards European/anglo history?

The article has extreme bias in favor of mentioning only Greek, Roman etc writing history, textbook data, etc. The article totally ignores the early influences of ancient Chinese, Mayan, African Etyptian (Khemetic), Persian, Babylonian, Indian scripts, texts, hieroglyphs, Chinese, etc. In actuality early Greeks typically spent a large part of their academic lives studying in Africa under the guidance of Egyptian teachers. In fact papyrus, paper, and most writing systems are based on (and typically created by) non-Europeans. Due to such biases both in this article, and inherent in many Wikipedia articles (and thus in lesson plans since many educators use Wikipedia as a reference for developing such lessons) students learn the European perspective only and conclude that black people, indians and non-whites are inferior and gave humanity nothing of value (thus spreading racism). We are responsible for ending the white-washing of academics and research. A similar bias exists against females. Many articles and academic institutions, focus purely on the male creations, without giving proper credit to the females involved in the area being discussed/researched. We must end bigotry. Thanks for your time. Academic non-racist. I would edit the main article but when I try to make such edits, bigoted editors block me from editing on Wikipedia, so I have been banished to the land of the "talk page", by my own self-censorship after such racist experiences.

Advertising?

There seems to be a lot of ads in this article for various textbook exchange services. Should this be removed? Sifaka 23:14, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

yeah well I agree with you. can't see how these inline links are any different from publishing spam in the external links.

I happened to catch my roommate adding one of the booksellers. He was trying to do the right thing and contribute just like I'm trying to do the right thing and getting rid of this nonsense. Wikipedia has been overrun with .com's inserting "enyclopedic" entries on their companies, inserting their inlink and/or external links on entries or keywords that match their business in hopes of getting advertising by Wiki readers as well as boosting their search engine visibility. This is crap. Every Wikipedia entry talks about an item that someone somewhere sells. Should we include the top 1000 sellers for hammers on the hammer Wiki entry? Does this serve an enyclopedic purpose? What I suggest is that we delete this spam and put a Google link for "used textbooks" or "textbooks exchange" at the bottom of the page as an outbound link. This clears the entry of spam and lets the user get more information on specific companies if that's what's wanted. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 75.18.183.82 (talk • contribs) 03:13, 8 September 2006 (UTC).

Links to search engine results are to be avoided per Wikipedia's external links guidelines. --Muchness 03:40, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Even so, those templates in the beginning of the article look really, really ugly. Belard 03:14, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

This page is good example of why Wikipedia, while a fun site, will never be taken seriously as a research tool. The person who started this article obviously had an axe to grind WRT textbooks, and the fact that he started wikitexts further shows that this is the case. While an encyclopedia is meant to be more than a dictionary, it's also not meant to be an editorial page, and much of this article reads like one. I am not going to edit the article, but if I did, I'd lop off all the "controversy" discussion, and focus more on the history, usage, development, and future of textbooks. What is in here now is...pretty poor.

I agree, any information related to disputes or controversy should be a seperate article all together. The issues behind them are a substantial part of current American culture, but is still seperate from the books themselves and is more relevant to 'student' or 'publisher'.

Overly American bias

This article should be altered to encompass relevant comment about textbooks in countries OUTSIDE of the USA. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Nutty timmy (talk • contribs) 17:49, 9 March 2007 (UTC). Agreed, but are you going to contribute?

I put the information relevant internationally on the top, and added a Swedish point of view. Thus, I assume other nationalities might contribute, adding details of their system. Therefore, I think the American-bias sign can be removed. You can put it back if you disagree. Mikael Häggström 06:19, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Textbook Publishing Industry

A college proffessor once told me that his manuscript was rejected because it was short on filler; he only wanted to include that which he thought was necessary for two semesters on English Composition, but he had said that (on his account, his narrative, lecture) the publishers said it needed to fit certain specifications of length to be sold; and he went on to say that such publishing companies are owned by or have stock market shares related to petroleum companies...Does any one know where I can find good literature either validating or invalidating such statements with regards to oil companies influencing American education or the manufacture of college textbooks?--Recoverypsychology 18:05, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Response: Not true. Most publishing companies are owned by international conglomerates, and are either publicly traded companies with no direct ties to oil companies or are owned by private equity funds. Oil companies have little to no influence on the manufacture of college textbooks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.122.161.14 (talk) 01:27, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Author's POV

As one who has published a textbook (albeit with an extremely limited audience), I don't really think that anyone ends up fantastically wealthy, which is not to say that they don't make a living. I spent the biggest part of a year of my life writing and then editing that book. My return...12.5% of the Net, and I'm told that is a good first contract. I would be absolutely delighted to sell 5000 copies per year because of the limited market (the subject is emergency management). The book itself is $70/copy retail. If that happens, I will end up with $3000-4000, which I will then pay taxes on. The normal markup on textbooks at retail is about 20%, so the retailers aren't getting rich either, just making a living. The publisher will end up with about 2/3 of the purchase price, but for that, they have to solicit new acquisitions, have editors to hold the hands of new authors, have people to copyedit, to proofread, to produce covers and other artwork, to obtain permissions for illustrations and other materials used by the author. They then have to physically produce the book (in my case about $10.00/copy), warehouse it, market it, and ship it (I sent 6 copies to colleagues in Australia and the UK...shipping=$100, although admittedly cheaper in bulk). Then as part of the marketing process, they have to give away 'desk copies' to educators, for consideration of adopting the text in question. If enough of them do...you might do okay with sales...but the reality is, talking with other professors, they get 20 or more desk copies for every book that they actually order. All in, after everything is paid for, the publisher will probably make about $10/copy. That being said, within five years the knowledge of the field will probably have changed enough that the old edition will have to be discarded and replaced, and the whole process begins again. Publishers earn their living on volume, not price, and they actually publish certain texts repeatedly at a loss, in order to enhance their reputations. The textbooks that students DONT pay for...high school texts for example, are generally a much better earner for the publisher than college and specialty texts. Nobody gets rich from textbooks, so the suggestions of greed are not entirely appropriate, and most authors tend to be academics who are passionate about their subject, or are hoping to advance their academic careers through publication.

This creates an interesting situation. What you are REALLY arguing about here is the value of intellectual property. The creator of the property put a good deal of work into that property, and appears to be asking for a fair price, in most cases, in order to provide you with access to that information. If you want to take this argument into other areas...you routinely pay $15-20 for a music CD that costs the record company fifty cents to produce. You routinely pay a similar amount for a DVD of a popular film, the DVD costing under a dollar to produce. The point here is that it isn't the recording medium, but the content that is valuable...THAT is what you are paying for.

So then, like the band that is already making millions of dollars off their work, or the film producer who is doing the same, isn't a textbook author entitled to a fair return for a year or more of work put into a product that you will benefit from directly? The very fact that albums and films are pirated all the time, and that textbooks are not, should tell you something very important about textbooks. If there were enough of a profit margin to make it worthwhile, someone would be ripping that off too! In some senses, that is actually what the resale of used textbooks is about, and would be illegal if I had anything to say about it. If you don't want to buy the book...go to the library and borrow it. I find it remarkable that in our society, knowledge and intellectual property are ceasing to have any value to anyone. There is this sense of entitlement, as if people believe that they have a RIGHT to pirate intellectual property, and that the mere fact that something is expensive entitles them to both criticize the producer of said product, and to steal it, if they can. From the perspective of the student, you need to look at what has actually happened to the cost of your tuition over the past forty years (it hasn't gone up nearly as much as you think!), how much of it is subsidized by the rest of us (you don't pay the whole bill...believe me!!!), and what has happened to the cost of textbooks in the same period (less than doubled in forty years, and some titles have actually decreased in price!!!). Before anyone screams too much about how 'greedy' the textbook publishing industry is being, you need to examine the sense of entitlement that so many of you seem to be cultivating. Many people seem to have lost track of the fact that education and access to knowledge are privileges...NOT something that you are entitled to. Food for thought. Emrgmgmtca (talk) 12:07, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Emrgmgmtca, did you have specific suggestions to improve this article?WeisheitSuchen (talk) 14:26, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

It seems to me that everything up to my post in here was entirely POV. If you take a good look at the Talk page up to this point, or indeed to the article itself, there seems to be a great deal of bashing of 'greedy publishers' and suggestions as to how to bypass the system (because, after all, we are ALL getting rich!) such as reselling used textbooks. I was attempting to present another point of view, in an attempt to balance this discussion and the article. I was also trying to ensure that those arguing about how greedy we all were understood that intellectual property has value, and that this value should not be ignored simply because it was inconvenient. Still, if the intent is to let the rant go on unchallenged, who am I to argue?Emrgmgmtca (talk) 15:11, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Why don't you point out some specific places in the article that you feel don't meet NPOV? I'd be happy to work with you on making the article itself more neutral. Most of the discussion on this page isn't really appropriate, your post included. Talk pages should be used to discuss improvements to the article. WeisheitSuchen (talk) 16:11, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

We'll try it your way. I'm always happy to try to work together. I've just gone through the content of the article and removed all of the references that were dead links. There was so much reliance on one particular website (in some cases even when it wasn't directly identified in the reference} that I am challenged to understand whether the article is supposed to be about textbooks, or about that particular website and organization. I've also removed several that did not lead to the information that they were claiming to support. I've also removed three that deliberately (in my opinion) misquoted the references in the article content. I've added a whole list of 'fact', 'relevance', and related tags. I've presented a contrasting point of view in some cases (we'll see how long THOSE last). The great pity is that no tags exist for 'self serving', 'unbelievably biased', 'ignores facts', etc.. Whether or not my post was appropriate, it at least tried to explain why I was taking the positions that I was taking. It is sometimes a little frustrating to watch people spout off on their own personal agendae, and not being allowed to debate their positions. If this material was prepared by college students, we are in big trouble. Between writing style, complete bias and lack of balance, and flat out nonsense as references, I would have given any of my students an 'F' for this effort.Emrgmgmtca (talk) 17:52, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm sorry that you find the Wikipedia way (not "my way") of getting things done so burdensome. Perhaps you'd feel happier at Knol? I appreciate you going through the article and marking points that need clear references or to be removed. It's really helpful to be able to focus on specific areas of highest priority. A general NPOV tag for a whole article isn't always helpful in pinpointing where changes are needed, so it's not uncommon to see those banners lasting for months (or longer) without much improvement.

I did, however, notice that none of the content you added includes citations. You can take the high road by showing people who you feel have used the article to promote an agenda how to do this properly by making sure that your own contributions are NPOV and not original research based on your personal experience as an author. Your statements under "Open Textbooks," for example, should be cited. "It seems merely logical that authors would be willing to undertake the work for free" should have something to back it up (and I think you meant illogical). I don't think you'll have a problem finding someone from traditional publishing to cite arguing that an open publishing model doesn't make sense. If you're worried about your contributions being removed, the best way to keep them in the article is to back them up with sources. WeisheitSuchen (talk) 19:22, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

I've added some additional sources to the Broken Market and Used Book sections with some additional balance. In the Used Book section, I replaced the statement about new homework problems (which wasn't supported by the source cited) with a quote that actually is in the article. I think the Crimson counts as a reliable source, and the new quote makes it clearer that this is an opinion held by some educators but maybe not universally regarded as a fact. I also noted criticisms of the PIRG report. Are these two sections OK now? WeisheitSuchen (talk) 23:03, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Since there was no objection, I removed the POV tag from that section. I hope to get a chance to work on some of the other sections in the next few weeks. I welcome anyone else's help though. WeisheitSuchen (talk) 13:53, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

I've been a little distracted by other things for the past couple of weeks. Fear not, it was always my intention to come back and added the appropriate references. With respect to preferring Knol, I like it just fine right here, thank you. If you have some objection to the voicing of frustration, which is apparently the case, you might at least consider the fact that I am doing so on the TALK page and not in the article itself. Emrgmgmtca (talk) 18:59, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

You sounded like you resented having to follow Wikipedia's guidelines, hence the question about whether Wikipedia is a good fit for you. Your "We'll try it your way" comment doesn't sound like you believe that the five pillars or that you think the Wikipedia guidelines are something I personally came up with to irritate you. And yes, I do prefer that we expend our energy on productive actions like improving articles rather than simply complaining. There are plenty of forums online where you can rant and "voice your frustrations"; this isn't the place to do it. That's why you got the warning about using the talk page for discussing content rather than the article. It doesn't belong anywhere in Wikipedia, in the article or on the talk page. Wikipedia is not a forum.

I look forward to seeing the promised references in your content. For future edits, you can create the content in a sandbox page and then wait to add it to an article until you have actually finished it. Then we don't have to guess that it's your intention to add references; you'll already have them.WeisheitSuchen (talk) 20:04, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Actually, you won't need to worry about the references. As I said, I was a little busy elsewhere and mad a commitment to come back and add the references. Well, I came back today and guess what? Virtually all of the changes that I added have been removed! Funny how content can sit for ages with no more challenge than a 'citation needed' tag, but when an article is being operated on by those with an agenda... The rules somehow become more important than the content. Without, as you put it, 'feeding the trolls' too much, this article is completely biased and unworthy of inclusion in any encyclopedia, and someone (singular or plural) seems determined to keep it that way. I haven't the time, or the interest, in having an edit war, so I will let those determined to keep their 'pet article' have it, and go back to articles and areas with actual credibility. Funny, you might have thought that an article about textbooks would have welcomed some input from the actual author of a textbook...but then...I suppose that this is one of those situations where everyone is entitled to input...as long as it agrees with yours.206.130.173.55 (talk) 18:11, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

My apologies. I had forgotten to log in. Just in case there are any questions about the above post, it originated with me.Emrgmgmtca (talk) 18:16, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Your content is still there, and it still needs references. I'm not sure why you think it was removed. I can see content you added under Textbook Exchanges and Open Textbooks. I'm not sure why you think there's an edit war when it's all still there. Can you clarify what you mean by "edit war" that is turning you off from continuing to edit this article? If you mean some of the tags you added for citations needed, I did remove some of those when I added references. I also removed a POV banner, as discussed above. Is that what you mean by "edit war," that when I made improvements that I removed your tags? WeisheitSuchen (talk) 18:58, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Basic and Current Info

Nothing I came to the Wikipedia to look for about tesxbooks is here If I were a Wikipedian, I would mark this for speedy deletion. How many text are written for the same course? How does the writing of texts get paid for (what percentage goes to the professor?) Does your professor get paid for requiring you to buy a text. There are many question and peer reviewed papers on the textbook industry. Not one peer reviewed publication is referenced and no actual facts are given. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Scottprovost (talk • contribs) 08:14, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

You're welcome to mark it for deletion, but I'm confident it would survive the challenge. There are currently 34 sources in this article, and it's clearly notable. Reliable sources don't have to be peer-reviewed journals, although of course those are a great choice when available. News sources are also considered reliable sources. In this article, that would include the Crimson, Inside Higher Ed, the Chronicle, KansasCity.com, etc. If you notice, there are also several .gov sites in the references, just like the one you copied and pasted from in your edits. The claim of "no actual facts" doesn't make much sense to me. Even if you only consider it a "fact" if it includes a number, this section clearly would meet that criteria "A study conducted by The Student PIRGs found that a new edition costs 12% more than a new copy of previous edition, and 58% more than a used copy of the previous edition. Textbook publishers maintain these new editions are driven by faculty demand. The Student PIRGs' study found that 76% of faculty said new editions were justified “half of the time or less” and 40% said they were justified “rarely” or “never.”[4]"

That said, if you would like to add some peer-reviewed journals as sources to answer some of your questions as you research them elsewhere, I think that could help the article. Just make sure that you paraphrase or summarize the sources rather than copying and pasting paragraphs from them. WeisheitSuchen (talk) 12:53, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

better cites and sources

would not hurt, however. There is a fair bit of interpretation in this text. –SJ +

Textbook bias

Textbook bias on controversial topics

"In cases of history, science, current events, and political textbooks, the writer might be biased towards one way or another. Controversial topics, like atheism, actions of a country, presidential actions, and scientific theories are usually the most common biases.[45]"

This section definitely needs fixing. I just read the news article it came from and noticed that the article did not talk about textbooks on current events, science or political textbooks, but discussed only one history textbook. It only discusses one textbook and the problems in it. I am sure there are many other writings out there that specifically talk about text book bias. As it stands this section needs to be fixed and quickly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by ZgokE (talk • contribs) 00:05, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Further on POV

To quote: "The "broken market" The textbook market does not operate in exactly the same manner as most consumer markets. First, the end consumers (students) do not select the product, and the product is not purchased by faculty or professors. Therefore, price is removed from the purchasing decision, giving the producer (publishers) disproportionate market power to set prices high. Similarities are found in the pharmaceutical industry, which sells its wares to doctors, rather than the ultimate end-user (i.e. patient). This fundamental difference in the market is often cited as the primary reason that prices are out of control. The term "Broken Market" first appeared in Economist James Koch's analysis of the market commissioned by the Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance.[3]"

Author here introduces the concept of a broken market (one which, paradoxically, is making tons of cash, which seems to be a pain point for the author) but author reasons about this by analogy (drugs marketed to doctors, not to patients == books marketed to schools, not to teachers or students). This needs support, because is the analogous element in the pharmaceutical case the _doctor_? So, potentially, this is an even stronger point than the author seems to express ... in support of a POV, namely, that textbooks of the old type are useless or too costly, and the myriad of tiny distributors of ebooks are showing the way. Citation [3] should be the starting point, and a quote or two from this article would be sufficient. Problem for the author is that the term broken market does not seem to occur in this source.

"This situation is exacerbated by the lack of competition in the textbook market. Consolidation in the past few decades has reduced the number of major textbook companies from around 30 to just a handful.[4]"

The url this links to has a decidedly different title than one would expect for the assertion it is supposed to support. Moreover, the URL itself has expired, so we do not know if it supports it at all! Since the article mentions, I think, at least 3 publishers and since it only points out two publishers in the 19th century, we do not know from the article of any support for this assertion. The author may be recalling a time when there were more publishers, but must have a POV issue if this idea cannot be supported by citation.

I would be glad to work with you on this to get a truly NPOV. Also to provide missing info...like the differences between K12 and higher ed textbook market, procedures and the concrete division of revenue between publisher, author, and others of revenues from different types of textbooks (those from micro-publishers as well as the big ones). Dkephart (talk) 15:13, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Origin of the word textbook

I find the word 'textbook' a little odd. There are loads of other books that contain text and coursebooks often contain more than just text. So what is the origin of the word? It is American English, so it can't be too old. DirkvdM (talk) 14:08, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

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NPOV dispute

Bias Towards European/anglo history?

Advertising?

Overly American bias

Textbook Publishing Industry

Author's POV

Basic and Current Info

better cites and sources

Textbook bias

Further on POV

Further reading needed

Origin of the word textbook

External links modified

External links modified