This classic study still provides one of the most acute descriptions available of an often misunderstood subculture: that of fantasy role playing games like Dungeons & Dragons. Gary Alan Fine immerses himself in several different gaming systems, offering insightful details on the nature of the games and the patterns of interaction among players—as well as their reasons for playing.
From the publisher of the beloved Water Bugs and Dragonflies comes a new picture book to support grieving children: My Heart Sings a Sad Song. The heart-warming artwork holds the reader tenderly through the ache of grief, as a young rabbit remembers a loved one who has died. Hospice chaplain Jennifer Fargo Lathrop says of My Heart Sings a Sad Song: “The illustration of talking to ‘my heart’ is especially meaningful, offering children a model of how to engage their emotions and their memories.”
In this thoughtful book, Gary Fine explores how Americans attempt to give meaning to the natural world that surrounds them. Although nature has often been treated as an unproblematic reality, Fine suggests that the meanings we assign to the natural environment are culturally grounded. In other words, there is no nature separate from culture. He calls this process of cultural construction and interpretation, naturework. Of course, there is no denying the biological reality of trees, mountains, earthquakes, and hurricanes, but, he argues, they must be interpreted to be made meaningful. Fine supports this claim by examining the fascinating world of mushrooming. Based on three years of field research with mushroomers at local and national forays, Morel Tales highlights the extensive range of meanings that mushrooms have for mushroomers. Fine details how mushroomers talk about their finds--turning their experiences into fish stories (the one that got away), war stories, and treasure tales; how mushroomers routinely joke about dying from or killing others with misidentified mushrooms, and how this dark humor contributes to the sense of community among collectors. He also describes the sometimes friendly, sometimes tense relations between amateur mushroom collectors and professional mycologists. Fine extends his argument to show that the elaboration of cultural meanings found among mushroom collectors is equally applicable to birders, butterfly collectors, rock hounds, and other naturalists.
From Henry Darger's elaborate paintings of young girls caught in a vicious war to the sacred art of the Reverend Howard Finster, the work of outsider artists has achieved unique status in the art world. Celebrated for their lack of traditional training and their position on the fringes of society, outsider artists nonetheless participate in a traditional network of value, status, and money. After spending years immersed in the world of self-taught artists, Gary Alan Fine presents Everyday Genius, one of the most insightful and comprehensive examinations of this network and how it confers artistic value. Fine considers the differences among folk art, outsider art, and self-taught art, explaining the economics of this distinctive art market and exploring the dimensions of its artistic production and distribution. Interviewing dealers, collectors, curators, and critics and venturing into the backwoods and inner-city homes of numerous self-taught artists, Fine describes how authenticity is central to the system in which artists—often poor, elderly, members of a minority group, or mentally ill—are seen as having an unfettered form of expression highly valued in the art world. Respected dealers, he shows, have a hand in burnishing biographies of the artists, and both dealers and collectors trade in identities as much as objects. Revealing the inner workings of an elaborate and prestigious world in which money, personalities, and values affect one another, Fine speaks eloquently to both experts and general readers, and provides rare access to a world of creative invention-both by self-taught artists and by those who profit from their work. “Indispensable for an understanding of this world and its workings. . . . Fine’s book is not an attack on the Outsider Art phenomenon. But it is masterful in its anatomization of some of its contradictions, conflicts, pressures, and absurdities.”—Eric Gibson, Washington Times
Far from mere idle tales, rumors are a valuable window into our anxieties and fears. Rumors let us talk as a community about some very inflammatory issues--issues that may be embarrassing or disturbing to discuss-allowing us to act as if we are talking about real events, not personal beliefs. We can air our hidden fears and desires without claiming these attitudes as our own. In The Global Grapevine, two leading authorities on rumor, folklore, and urban legend--Gary Alan Fine and Bill Ellis--shed light on what contemporary rumors can tell us about the fears and pressures of globalization. In particular, they examine four major themes that emerge over and over again: rumors about terrorism, about immigration, about international trade, and about tourism. The authors analyze how various rumors underscore American reactions to perceived global threats, show how we interpret our changing world, and highlight fears, fantasies, and cherished beliefs about our place in the world. Along the way the book examines a wide variety of rumors-that the Israelis were behind 9-11, the President knew of the attack in advance, tourists wake up in foreign countries with their kidneys stolen, foreign workers urinate in vats of beer destined to be shipped to America. These rumors, the authors argue, reflect our anxieties and fears about contact with foreign cultures-whether we believe foreign competition to be poisoning the domestic economy or that foreign immigration to be eroding American values. Rumors are the visible tip of a vast iceberg of hidden anxieties. Illuminating the most widely circulated rumors in America in recent years, The Global Grapevine offers an invaluable portrait of what these tales reveal about contemporary society.
What are boys like? Who is the creature inhabiting the twilight zone between the perils of the Oedipus complex and the Strum und Drang of puberty? In With the Boys, Gary Alan Fine examines the American male preadolescent by studying the world of Little League baseball. Drawings on three years of firsthand observation of five Little Leagues, Fine describes how, through organized sport and its accompanying activities, boys learn to play, work, and generally be "men.
Whether it is used as an icebreaker in conversation or as the subject of serious inquiry, “the weather” is one of the few subjects that everyone talks about. And though we recognize the faces that bring us the weather on television, how government meteorologists and forecasters go about their jobs is rarely scrutinized. Given recent weather-related disasters, it’s time we find out more. In Authors of the Storm, Gary Alan Fine offers an inside look at how meteorologists and forecasters predict the weather. Based on field observation and interviews at the Storm Prediction Center in Oklahoma, the National Weather Service in Washington, D.C., and a handful of midwestern outlets, Fine finds a supremely hard-working, insular clique of professionals who often refer to themselves as a “band of brothers.” In Fine’s skilled hands, we learn their lingo, how they “read” weather conditions, how forecasts are written, and, of course, how those messages are conveyed to the public. Weather forecasts, he shows, are often shaped as much by social and cultural factors inside local offices as they are by approaching cumulus clouds. By opening up this unique world to us, Authors of the Storm offers a valuable and fascinating glimpse of a crucial profession.
When you get right down to it, taking the intestine of an animal and stuffing it with the ground meat of that animal doesn’t really seem all that intuitive an approach to food preparation. But, as Gary Allen shows in this rich and engaging history, people worldwide have been making sausage for thousands of years. A veritable alphabet of sausages, from the Cajun andouille—and its less spicy forerunner, a French saucisson of the same name––and Mexican chorizo all the way to the Italian zampone, Allen tells a story of relentless creativity and invention, as different cultures found countless delectable ways to transform these otherwise unappealing pieces of meat. Allen peppers his account with examples from all over the world, as well as antique posters and advertisements, artworks and cartoons; together, they build a picture of a food that has been beloved—even as it’s scoffed at—throughout human history, and remains a spicy favorite today.
We take reputations for granted. Believing in the bad and the good natures of our notorious or illustrious forebears is part of our shared national heritage. Yet we are largely ignorant of how such reputations came to be, who was instrumental in creating them, and why. Even less have we considered how villains, just as much as heroes, have helped our society define its values. Presenting essays on America's most reviled traitor, its worst president, and its most controversial literary ingénue (Benedict Arnold, Warren G. Harding, and Lolita), among others, sociologist Gary Alan Fine analyzes negative, contested, and subcultural reputations. Difficult Reputations offers eight compelling historical case studies as well as a theoretical introduction situating the complex roles in culture and history that negative reputations play. Arguing the need for understanding real conditions that lead to proposed interpretations, as well as how reputations are given meaning over time, this book marks an important contribution to the sociologies of culture and knowledge.
In this second volume of the GemQuest series, the battle lines have been drawn. The Dark Lord reaches beyond his realms in search of the heir, and the disparate nations of the world begin to recognize the magnitude of his evil. They rise up united and renew their bonds. From the dazzling ice kingdom of Eleutheria to the magnificent tree-top city of Seramour, revived allies succor and protect the Twins during the preparation for their all-important quest for the Gem of Eternity. But first Davmiran must be awoken from his spell of slumber. Colton dar Agonthea, nemesis of life, thwarted previously in the city of Pardatha, is determined to capture or kill the heir before he is revived, thus putting an end to the prophecy and preventing him once and for all from fulfilling his destiny.
In Talking Art, acclaimed ethnographer Gary Alan Fine gives us an eye-opening look at the contemporary university-based master’s-level art program. Through an in-depth analysis of the practice of the critique and other aspects of the curriculum, Fine reveals how MFA programs have shifted the goal of creating art away from beauty and toward theory. Contemporary visual art, Fine argues, is no longer a calling or a passion—it’s a discipline, with an academic culture that requires its practitioners to be verbally skilled in the presentation of their intentions. Talking Art offers a remarkable and disconcerting view into the crucial role that universities play in creating that culture.
Legends are arguably the most common narrative form of folklore in American society. From sex acts to business transactions, from fashion to food, from heroes to heroin, rumors and legends take on every charged topic. Children circulate texts about toys and candy; teenagers share stories about sex, drugs, and rock and roll; young professionals commiserate over the hazards of the work world. These stories address aspects of life about which we receive mixed or ambiguous messages. Given that matters relevant to race remain confused and divisive in many corridors of American society, it is not surprising that rumors and legends that reflect racial misunderstanding and mistrust frequently circulate. Whispers on the Color Line focuses on a wide array of tales told in black and white communities across America. Topics run the gamut from alleged governmental conspiracies, possible food tampering, gang violence, and the sex lives of celebrities. Such beliefs travel by word of mouth, in print, and increasingly over the Internet. In many instances these stories reflect the tenacious level of racial misunderstanding that continues to vex efforts to foster racial harmony, creating separate racialized pools of knowledge. The authors have spent over twenty years collecting and analyzing rumors and contemporary legends--from the ever-durable Kentucky Fried Rat cycle to persistent beliefs about athletic footwear manufacturers and their support for white supremacist regimes. These implausible stories serve many purposes: they assuage anxieties, entertain friends, increase our sense of control--all without directly proclaiming our own attitudes. Fine and Turner consider how these tales reflect attitudes that blacks and whites have both about each other and about the world they face. In an engaging and penetrating narrative, they brilliantly demonstrate how--by transforming unacceptable impulses into a narrative that is claimed to have actually happened--we are able to express the inexpressible.
Kitchens' takes the reader into the robust, overheated, backstage world of the contemporary restaurant. In this portrait of the real lives of kitchen workers, the author brings their experiences, challenges, and satisfactions to life.
A deeply researched ethnographic portrait of progressive senior activists in Chicago who demonstrate how a tiny public wields collective power to advocate for broad social change. If you've ever been to a protest or been involved in a movement for social change, you have likely experienced a local culture, one with slogans, jargon, and shared commitments. Though one might think of a cohort of youthful organizers when imagining protest culture, this powerful ethnography from esteemed sociologist Gary Alan Fine explores the world of senior citizens on the front lines of progressive protests. While seniors are a notoriously important—and historically conservative—political cohort, the group Fine calls “Chicago Seniors Together” is a decidedly leftist organization, inspired by the model of Saul Alinsky. The group advocates for social issues, such as affordable housing and healthcare, that affect all sectors of society but take on a particular urgency in the lives of seniors. Seniors connect and mobilize around their distinct experiences but do so in service of concerns that extend beyond themselves. Not only do these seniors experience social issues as seniors—but they use their age as a dramatic visual in advocating for political change. In Fair Share, Fine brings readers into the vital world of an overlooked political group, describing how a “tiny public” mobilizes its demands for broad social change. In investigating this process, he shows that senior citizen activists are particularly savvy about using age to their advantage in social movements. After all, what could be more attention-grabbing than a group of passionate older people determinedly shuffling through snowy streets with canes, in wheelchairs, and holding walkers to demand healthcare equity, risking their own health in the process?
If all politics is local, then so is almost everything else, argues sociologist Gary Alan Fine. We organize our lives by relying on those closest to us—family members, friends, work colleagues, team mates, and other intimates—to create meaning and order. In this thoughtful and wide-ranging book, Fine argues that the basic building blocks of society itself are forged within the boundaries of such small groups, the "tiny publics" necessary for a robust, functioning social order at all levels. Action, meaning, authority, inequality, organization, and institutions all have their roots in small groups. Yet for the past twenty-five years social scientists have tended to ignore the power of groups in favor of an emphasis on organizations, societies, or individuals. Based on over thirty-five years of Fine's own ethnographic research across an array of small groups, Tiny Publics presents a compelling new theory of the pivotal role of small groups in organizing social life. No social system can thrive without flourishing small groups. They provide havens in an impersonal world, where faceless organizations become humanized. Taking examples from such diverse worlds as Little League baseball teams, restaurant workers, high school debate teams, weather forecasters, and political volunteers, Fine demonstrates how each group has its own unique culture, or idioculture—the system of knowledge, beliefs, behavior, and customs that define and hold a group together. With their dense network of relationships, groups serve as important sources of social and cultural capital for their members. The apparently innocuous jokes, rituals, and nicknames prevalent within Little League baseball teams help establish how teams function internally and how they compete with other teams. Small groups also provide a platform for their members to engage in broader social discourse and a supportive environment to begin effecting change in larger institutions. In his studies of mushroom collectors and high school debate teams, Fine demonstrates the importance of stories that group members tell each other about their successes and frustrations in fostering a strong sense of social cohesion. And Fine shows how the personal commitment political volunteers bring to their efforts is reinforced by the close-knit nature of their work, which in turn has the power to change larger groups and institutions. In this way, the actions and debates begun in small groups can eventually radiate outward to affect every level of society. Fine convincingly demonstrates how small groups provide fertile ground for the seeds of civic engagement. Outcomes often attributed to large-scale social forces originate within such small-scale domains. Employing rich insights from both sociology and social psychology, as well as vivid examples from a revealing array of real-work groups, Tiny Publics provides a compelling examination of the importance of small groups and of the rich vitality they bring to social life. A Volume in the Russell Sage Foundation Series on Trust
Despite his ceaseless efforts to purge his fellow citizens of their unfounded opinions and to bring them to care for what he believes to be the most important things, Plato's Socrates rarely succeeds in his pedagogical project with the characters he encounters. This is in striking contrast to the historical Socrates, who spawned the careers of Plato, Xenophon, and other authors of Socratic dialogues. Through an examination of Socratic pedagogy under its most propitious conditions, focusing on a narrow class of dialogues featuring Lysis and Alcibiades, this book answers the question: "why does Plato portray his divinely appointed gadfly as such a dramatic failure?
Discover the keys to effective organizational transformation from an author who did it as the CEO of an iconic company In Driving Results: Six Lessons Learned from Transforming an Iconic Company, now-retired Chief Executive Officer Gary Garfield delivers an incisive and eye-opening road map of how to transform any organization, department, or group. Through a series of massive changes, Garfield drove record results while the CEO. By sharing his learnings on driving change in this insightful book, you’ll learn how you can use the six essential elements to drive results through change at your organization or with your team. In the book, the celebrated author presents: Startling insights into the symptoms of a dysfunctional organization or group—and how to turn it around Comprehensive explanations of each of the six keys to transformation and how to implement them in any company or team Strategies for selling change throughout your organization or group to ensure its success The hallmarks of successful change leaders The importance of culture and how to change it Critical people issues that so often arise during transformation efforts and how to deal with those issues A must-read collection of thought-provoking, practical, and hands-on methods for delivering impactful and quantifiable change in any environment, Driving Results is the blueprint for transforming any organization or group into a high-performing and culturally healthy powerhouse.
A wonderful historical mystery! Join President Grover Cleveland and his young bride as their resort honeymoon is interrupted by murder and intrigue, forcing the appealing couple to become detectives and solve the crime! The year is 1886. Grover Cleveland, 22nd President of the United States, has taken a bride at age 49, the lovely 21 year old Frances Folsom. Married in the White House itself they have raced by carriage, meddlesome reporters trailing their every move, to take a private train to the Victorian mountain resort in Deer Park, Maryland, where they hope to share a wonderful honeymoon. But, unbeknownst to them, there are dastardly schemes afoot and the suspicious death of one of the reporters complicates things for the happy couple, forcing them to investigate the mystery with the help of the police and special agents guarding them. Gary Alan Ruse, author of mysteries, science fiction and techno-thrillers, has crafted a delightful period mystery tale readers are sure to enjoy!
The Christians I come in contact with almost unanimously want to know God's will for their lives. They often struggle, sometimes heart wrenchingly, to grab on to what God wants them to do. The questions of how to know God's will continually come up in Bible studies, in Sunday school, in pastor's messages to the congregation, and in various other ways. People seem to be continually searching for God's will, but not really finding it. So the question begs to be asked, why is it so hard to know God's will? Why is there such a struggle? In actuality God has made it easier for us than you probably realize. God has given us such a golden opportunity to know him more personally than any other generation before Christ. God does not want us to struggle to know Him and His will. Find how to strengthen your relationship with God, understand what He says His will is, and find where God is leading.
Though Arista Networks is a relative newcomer in the data center and cloud networking markets, the company has already had considerable success. In this book, renowned consultant and technical author Gary Donahue (Network Warrior) provides an in-depth, objective guide to Arista’s lineup of hardware, and explains why its network switches and Extensible Operating System (EOS) are so effective. Anyone with a CCNA or equivalent knowledge will benefit from this book, especially entrenched administrators, engineers, or architects tasked with building an Arista network. Is Arista right for your data center? Pick up this guide and find out. Topic highlights include: SysDB: the EOS system database that holds state, statuses, and variables Multichassis Link Aggregation (MLAG): for linking a port-channel to multiple switches instead of just one Latency Analyzer (LANZ): the interface-buffer troubleshooting tool with a reporting granularity of one millisecond VM Tracer: for adding, changing, and removing VLANs without human interaction Zero-Touch Provisioning (ZTP): for remote switch configuration Hardware advantages: including merchant silicon, low-latency networking, and power consumption Gotchas: issues with Arista switches or systems
Erotic Wisdom provides a careful reading of one of Plato's most beloved dialogues, the Symposium, which explores the nature and scope of human desire (erôs). Gary Alan Scott and William A. Welton engage all of the dialogue's major themes, devoting special attention to illuminating Plato's conception of philosophy. In the Symposium, Plato situates philosophy in an intermediate (metaxu) position—between need and resource, ignorance and knowledge—showing how the very lack of what one desires can become a guiding form of contact with the objects of human desire. The authors examine the concept of intermediacy in relation both to Platonic metaphysics and to Plato's moral psychology, arguing that philosophy, for Plato, is properly understood as a kind of "being in-between," as the love of wisdom (philosophia) rather than the possession of it.
What is sin? Is it simply wrongdoing? Why do its effects linger over time? In this sensitive, imaginative, and original work, Gary Anderson shows how changing conceptions of sin and forgiveness lay at the very heart of the biblical tradition. Spanning nearly two thousand years, the book brilliantly demonstrates how sin, once conceived of as a physical burden, becomes, over time, eclipsed by economic metaphors. Transformed from a weight that an individual carried, sin becomes a debt that must be repaid in order to be redeemed in God's eyes. Anderson shows how this ancient Jewish revolution in thought shaped the way the Christian church understood the death and resurrection of Jesus and eventually led to the development of various penitential disciplines, deeds of charity, and even papal indulgences. In so doing it reveals how these changing notions of sin provided a spur for the Protestant Reformation. Broad in scope while still exceptionally attentive to detail, this ambitious and profound book unveils one of the most seismic shifts that occurred in religious belief and practice, deepening our understanding of one of the most fundamental aspects of human experience.
This work considers how and why cities change their governing arrangements - and the implications for cities of the future. It provides case studies that show how actual cities have changed and adapted their structure to fit changing times and citizen demands.
In this third volume of the GemQuest series, captured and imprisoned by Colton, the wizard Premoran rails against his fate. Without Premoran, the essences of the ancient Lalas trees will be lost forever. While the Twins prepare to embark on their separate quests for the Gem of Eternity, another rises to aid the Lalas. Her name is Tamara, a Sister of Parth. Trained in the mustical mysteries, though unaware of the true extent of her power, she alone can traverse the Hollows – those empty spaces between life and death – to retrieve the eleventh shard , without which the Twins’ quest if doomed to fail. “For the first time in a long time, I lost myself in someone else’s creation. We all remember fondly the words we grew up reading, be they Narnia, Middle Earth or Lankhmar. Mythical places that shaped our imaginations and our creative minds, became a part of who we are. In these book we were unfettered, free to dream, to strive, to escape the mundane world that would hold us prisoner. That is the storytelller’s greatest gift. Gary Alan Wassner has that gift.” --Steve Savile, author of the Ogmios Short Novels series, the Jack Stone Thrillers and the Salley Reardon Supernatural Mysteries “Many authors fall short with their sequels, but Wassner keeps the story going, bringing new elements into the mix.” --Dag Rambraut, owner of ssfworld.com
... Taps into not only the rational aspects of the buying decision, but also the emotional drivers, which are recognised as being crucial to a full understanding of buyer behaviour." Clive Chafer, Director Master-0McNeil IncTo succeed in today's business world of tough decision-makers, how you say something can actually be more important than what you say. Even the best ideas face resistence and rejection. Why? All too often people make the mistake of focussing solely on the content of their proposal and giving little thought to the way they will deliver it.In a two-year survey, customer research experts Miller and Williams studied 1,700 executives, discovered that good ideas are not enough; to make any sort of impact they must be delivered effectively. Whether it be a proposal or a business plan, The 5 Paths to Persuasion unlocks the secrets of persuasion neccessary to successfully present a plan.They reveal the five different types of decision maker: Charismatics; Thinkers; Sceptics; Followers; and Controllers and shows how to best sell ideas to each.
Sociological analysis has been replete with debates about “micro” and “macro,” individual and society, but all too often these miss the point: interacting groups are the hinge that connects them. To understand how structures matter and how individuals navigate them, we must take groups and people in local communities seriously. Gary Alan Fine and Tim Hallett skillfully argue that sociologists have the obligation to examine the role of small communities in the creation of both the interaction order and structural realities. With novel concepts and rich ethnographic examples, this book describes how group commitments shape selves and society, emphasizing the importance of a meso-level approach to social organization. Focusing on shared action, Fine and Hallett provide new models of identity, culture, conflict, and control. They conclude by considering how a network of groups can provide insight into extended communication channels and social media lattices. Ultimately they show that, despite the importance of institutions and individuals, group life is the fundamental building block of community. This timely book makes the case for a local sociology that includes sociality. It will be a welcomed resource for students and sociologists and a necessary call to action for the discipline as a whole.
Arista Networks has become a key player when it comes to software-driven cloud networking solutions for large data center storage and computing environments. In this updated edition of Arista Warrior, renowned consultant and technical author Gary Donahue Network Arista Networks has become a key player when it comes to software-driven cloud networking solutions for large data center, storage, and computing environments, and with their continued expansion and growth since the first edition was released, this book is a welcome update. In this updated edition of Arista Warrior, renowned trainer, consultant, and technical author Gary A. Donahue (Network Warrior) provides an in-depth, objective guide to Arista’s products explains why its network switches, software products, and Extensible Operating System (EOS) are so effective. Anyone with a CCNA or equivalent knowledge will benefit from this book, especially entrenched administrators, engineers, or architects tasked with building an Arista network. Is Arista right for your network? Pick up this in-depth guide and find out. In addition to the topics covered in the first edition, this book also includes: Configuration Management: Config sessions, config replace, etc. CloudVision: Arista’s management, workload orchestration, workflow automation, configuration, and telemetry tool VXLAN: Layer-2 overlay networking FlexRoute: Two million routes in hardware Tap Aggregation: Make your switch or blade into a Tap Aggregation device Advanced Mirroring: Mirror to a port-channel or even the CPU Network Design: A quick overview of the Arista recommended network designs vEOS: Arista’s Extensible Operating System in a VM with step-by-step instructions cEOS: Arista’s EOS in a container with examples eAPI: Arista’s fabulous extended Application Programmable Interface
Now part of the IVP Signature Collection, this landmark work from Gary Haugen offers stories of courageous Christians who stood up for justice in the face of human trafficking, forced prostitution, racial and religious persecution, and torture. Throughout he provides concrete guidance on how ordinary Christians can rise up to seek justice throughout the world.
One of the twentieth century’s most original and influential literary theorists, Stanley Fish is also known as a fascinatingly atypical, polarizing public intellectual; a loud, cigar-smoking contrarian; and a lightning rod for both the political right and left. The truth and the limitations of this reputation are explored in Stanley Fish, America’s Enfant Terrible by Gary A. Olson. At once a literary biography and a traditional life story, this engrossing volume details Fish’s vibrant personal life and his remarkably versatile career. Born into a tumultuous family, Fish survived life with an emotionally absent father and a headstrong mother through street sports and troublemaking as much as through his success at a rigorous prep school. As Olson shows, Fish’s escape from the working-class neighborhoods of 1940s and 1950s Providence, Rhode Island, came with his departure for the university life at the University of Pennsylvania and then Yale. His meteoric rise through the academic ranks at a troubled Vietnam-era UC-Berkeley was complemented by a 1966 romp through Europe that included drag racing through the streets of Seville in his Alfa Romeo. He went on to become an internationally prominent scholar at Johns Hopkins before moving to Duke, where he built a star-studded academic department that became a key site in the culture and theory wars of the 1980s and 1990s. Olson discusses Fish’s tenure as a highly visible dean at the University of Illinois at Chicago who clashed publicly with the state legislature. He also covers Fish’s most remarkable and controversial books, including Fish’s masterpiece, Surprised by Sin: The Reader in "Paradise Lost," which was a critical sensation and forever changed the craft of literary criticism, as well as Professional Correctness and Save the World on Your Own Time, two books that alienated Fish from most liberal-minded professors in English studies. Olson concludes his biography of Fish with an in-depth analysis of the contradictions between Fish’s public persona and his private personality, examining how impulses and events from Fish’s childhood shaped his lifelong practices and personality traits. Also included are a chronology of the major events of Fish’s life and never-before-published photos. Based on hundreds of hours of recorded interviews with friends, enemies, colleagues, former students, family members, and Fish himself, along with material from the Stanley Fish archive, Stanley Fish, America’s Enfant Terrible is a clearly written narrative of the life of an important and controversial scholar.
Thank you for visiting our website. Would you like to provide feedback on how we could improve your experience?
This site does not use any third party cookies with one exception — it uses cookies from Google to deliver its services and to analyze traffic.Learn More.