This book validates the reasonable sense readers might have that daily life has gotten strange. Howard focuses not on conspicuous crises that fill news cycles, like wars or elections, but the texture of everyday life where it may be hard to pinpoint what seems off. This book helps readers name ways that manners have become weird--keto diets alongside food porn, influencer as dream job, rehearsal dinners that come after weddings--and follows this disquiet into areas where people do some of their most important living. Chapters consider what we eat and what schools teach children, how we work, find love, raise families, and live faithfully. Pairing observation and explanation, Howard sets changes in historical context, American and her own, to help liberate readers from the tyranny of the present. Understanding how things got to be the way they are offers an antidote to current disquiet and preserves wonder at the good of embodied life.
About the Author :
Agnes R. Howard teaches history and humanities at Christ College, the Honors College of Valparaiso University, in Valparaiso, Indiana. She is author of Showing: What Pregnancy Tells Us About Being Human (2020).
Review :
"Agnes Howard reflects on her mission early in this beautifully lyrical book that is history, memoir, and cultural reflection all at once: 'Historical thinking is an accessible way for ordinary people to make sense of ordinary life.' As she renders ordinary life processes extraordinary, she shows how reflecting on the history of our own times and places can help us find a compass and orientation in a disorienting and disoriented world."
--Nadya Williams, author of Mothers, Children, and the Body Politic
"In addition to keenly observing and contextualizing the peculiarities of everyday American life in a way that's reminiscent of Tocqueville, Howard offers a generous vision of how Americans might make sense of what they have received and, in turn, flourish. Howard operates with the conviction that both the historical and the personal rightly inform contemporary living, and this bolsters her sympathetic proposals for 'better thinking' about everything from food to family life."
--Carrie Frederick Frost, Assistant Professor of Religion and Culture, Global Humanities and Religions, Western Washington University
"Agnes Howard thoughtfully observes how we make the core experiences of human life smaller and safer than they ought to be and then wonder why we are unsatisfied. She offers an invitation into the glory of man (and woman) fully alive."
--Leah Sargeant, author of The Dignity of Dependence
"Thoughtful and thought-provoking, Howard's writing is that unique blend of research that makes for truly excellent conversation--we do not have every answer, but we might, together, make our way towards something new."
--Hilary Yancey, author of Forgiving God: A Story of Faith
"Agnes Howard reflects on her mission early in this beautifully lyrical book that is history, memoir, and cultural reflection all at once: 'Historical thinking is an accessible way for ordinary people to make sense of ordinary life.' As she renders ordinary life processes extraordinary, she shows how reflecting on the history of our own times and places can help us find a compass and orientation in a disorienting and disoriented world."
--Nadya Williams, author of Mothers, Children, and the Body Politic
"In addition to keenly observing and contextualizing the peculiarities of everyday American life in a way that's reminiscent of Tocqueville, Howard offers a generous vision of how Americans might make sense of what they have received and, in turn, flourish. Howard operates with the conviction that both the historical and the personal rightly inform contemporary living, and this bolsters her sympathetic proposals for 'better thinking' about everything from food to family life."
--Carrie Frederick Frost, Assistant Professor of Religion and Culture, Global Humanities and Religions, Western Washington University
"Agnes Howard thoughtfully observes how we make the core experiences of human life smaller and safer than they ought to be and then wonder why we are unsatisfied. She offers an invitation into the glory of man (and woman) fully alive."
--Leah Sargeant, author of The Dignity of Dependence
"Thoughtful and thought-provoking, Howard's writing is that unique blend of research that makes for truly excellent conversation--we do not have every answer, but we might, together, make our way towards something new."
--Hilary Yancey, author of Forgiving God: A Story of Faith
