The A.A. Grapevine and The Language of the Heart

Ken B. Response to Man Talking about Publisher of The Language of the Heart

 

Aloha to you, Tom, from Maui, Hawaii!

 

My dad (Dick B.--www.DickB.com) copied me on his response to your email message in which you stated:

"The Language of the Heart . . . is not an AA General Service Conference-approved book . . ."

As my dad observed, his copy of The Language of the Heart has a large "circle-and-triangle" symbol on the Copyright page (with a copyright date of 1988). In addition, there is a large "circle-and-triangle" symbol on the back cover of the dust jacket of his copy. (The ISBN number of my dad's copy is: 0-933685-16-5.)

While doing some preliminary research on the question, I noted that The Language of the Heart is found in the "AA Conference Approved Books" section of the Minnesota Recovery Page Online Bookstore:

http://www.minnesotarecovery.info/books/AAConferenceApproved.htm

I also noted that The Language of the Heart is found on the four-page document titled "This list is Conference Approved Literature" on the Arkansas Central Office Web site:

http://www.arkansascentraloffice.org/documents/centraloffice.pdf

In addition, I noted that The Language of the Heart is found on the Literature page of Northern Santa Barbara County AA Central Office Web site under the heading "Conference Approved Literature Available through the Central Office":

http://aa52centraloffice.org/Literature.html

I also noted that, on a Web page on the Alcoholics Anonymous Central Coast NSW Web site which clearly distinguishes between "Conference Approved Literature" and "Non Conference Approved," the book The Language of the Heart is found in the "Conference Approved Literature" category:

http://www.ccaa.org.au/literature.htm

I also see that The Language of the Heart is listed in the "F-10 Literature Catalog - 2011-2012" currently posted on the AA.org Web site. It is found in the "A.A. Grapevine Subscriptions, Books, Audio, Special Items, eBooks, Audio Downloads" section on page 38:

http://www.aa.org/en_pdfs/aacatalog.pdf

And I just came across the following article in the December 2010 issue of the MIRUS (Minneapolis Intergroup: Recovery, Unity, Service) Web site:

"Is The Grapevine Conference-approved?"  [http://www.aaminneapolis.org/pages/mirus/Mirus_1210.pdf]

The article (May 2007 Vol. 63 No. 12) states:

"So individual issues of the magazine and Grapevine books are, by design, not Conference-approved."

(Copyright May 2007 A.A. Grapevine, Inc.)

I would accept the May 2007 article from The Grapevine as authoritative. I do find the presence of the "circle-and-triangle" symbol on the book and its listing on various Web sites as "Conference-approved" to be interesting.

Thank you for writing to Dick B.

 

Dick B.'s son, Ken