Region & Place 430
Monastic Stability: In One Place with God and Others
Some time ago I was asked if I would be willing to participate in a forum on localism. I hesitated. I did not even know what localism specifically was about…
Seeing Like A Traffic App
A year ago I started exploring my traffic navigation app, wondering what advice it would give about the various routes I took to work in southern California. I found the…
Christopher Lasch and the Lasting Dilemma of Localism
[Cross-posted to In Media Res] This past weekend, at the annual Front Porch Republic gathering (this year held at SUNY-Geneseo), three scholars reflected upon the writings of the historian and…
Wichita and the Dilemma of Mid-Sized Cities
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] There's been some depressing news here in Wichita, Kansas, of late. Not the sort of depressing news that one might typically fear to hear when…
Whatever Happened to Communitarianism?
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Twenty years ago, the concept and label "communitarianism" was riding high, or at least as high as any broadly applicable yet intellectually coherent ideological movement…
Kids These Days: Why We Shouldn’t Worry if They Don’t Leave Home Early
A popular version of the undying nostalgia for a golden era gone by is the view that this era was a time when men were men, and children grew into…
30 More Years of Rootless Professors
In the thirty years since writer-professor Eric Zencey first published his essay “The Rootless Professors” in the Chronicle of Higher Education, much has changed, and much hasn’t, regarding academe’s reputedly rootless…
The Silly Season is Here Again
Elections are here, but manure-spreading is nothing new.
Witchcraft in Church? Against Glamorous Worship
Recently, our local Trappist Monastery, the Abbey of the Genesee, unveiled a renovation of the sanctuary of the Abbey church. To the shock of some — those who often claim to…
Hanging Out with, and Learning from, Some Thoroughly Material Benedictines
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] A few weeks ago I was able to, once again, do something that I enjoy doing immensely--take a group of students out on a local…
Remembering a Good Oak
Trees cannot talk, but they do speak. With our eyes focused on franticly flickering screens, perhaps our ears have grown dull to their still small voices, yet they whisper on.…
Garage Sales, Yard Sales, Estate Sales: The Putrefaction of America
What used to be called garage sales and are now also called "yard" and "estate" sale are the scourge of the neighborhood and a major contributor to the putrefaction of America.…
Wendell Berry Opts Out of the ‘Culture of Violence’
Our Only World: Ten Essays. By Wendell Berry. Berkeley: Counterpoint, 2015. In January of 2012, Wendell Berry delivered a speech at Georgetown College that explained his support for legalizing gay…
When Your Hometown Goes International
New York City is not an American city; it’s an Arab nation filled with a thousand different tribes who grudgingly live amongst each other. Through its history, parts have tried…
Why Cities Ought to, Sometimes, Challenge Their States
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] On next Tuesday’s ballot here in Wichita, KS, voters will be able to, whether they realize it or not, directly contribute to an ongoing struggle…
Freedom and Four-Year Olds
Holland, MI In public policy, few things are ever entirely right or wrong. Like economics, we are often dealing with trade-offs. Ignoring the trade-offs blinds us to some of the…
History as Manifesto
Dillon, MT Having a personal and professional interest in what people think history is for, I read The History Manifesto with great interest. Jo Guldi (Brown) and David Armitage (Harvard)…
On Dying Where You’re Planted: The Rooted Pastor
Manchester, CT I am grudgingly accepting that you don’t choose the place; the place chooses you. I’ve moved around a lot during my time on the planet, first as luggage, then…
Local Wonderings in Wichita
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Wichita, KS, is the home to a wonderful bookstore, Eighth Day Books. (Which isn't my favorite bookstore in Wichita, but that's partly because my wife…
Praying in the Streets: Ritual as an Urban Design Problem
"[T]he city as World icon is being destroyed, not by being secularized (it was always secular at base with some sacral potencies shooting through it from every angle) but by…
Merry Christmas
Holland MI Today, Christians will celebrate the birth of Christ. Commenters on these pages have in the past noted some tensions between the Porch’s localist themes and the universalist themes…
When Nothing But A Local Newspaper Will Do
Recently the city council in my hometown decided we desperately needed a courthouse. Mind you, my hometown is not the state capital. It's not even the county seat. Florissant is a mid-size…
The Monday Morning Brass Spittoon: Roundtable on Immigration
Our panel discusses immigration policy from a localist perspective.