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Local Culture Update, Bookshop, and Dvořák in Iowa
A quick update for subscribers to Local Culture: the printing was delayed a bit by COVID-19-related causes. However, our printer was deemed “essential,” (I’m sure because of their efforts in…
Dorothy Day, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Jimmy Dorrell
“Dorothy Day’s Radical Faith.” Casey Cep takes the recent discussions regarding Dorothy Day’s potential sainthood as an occasion to consider her rich and bracing legacy. Keep an eye out for…
Food Sovereignty, Ed McClanahan, and Quarantine Notebook
“Beyond Originalism.” Adrian Vermeule is causing a stir with his conservative critique of originalism in the Atlantic. In its place, he advocates ”common-good constitutionalism.” I’m not sure the courts are the…
Local Food Systems, Good Stories, and Grassland 2.0
Many of the essays being published right now respond to the coronavirus, and while I’ll link to a few of these below, they all suffer from our fundamental ignorance of…
Wendell Berry’s Distractions, Productive Households, and Factory Farming
“Wendell Berry: The Poet of Place.” Silas House corresponds with Berry about the work of faithful dwelling and writing: I think my work also has benefited from distractions. There are…
Poems, Essays, Stories, and Songs for a Pandemic
When despair for the world grows in me . . .
Limits, Fantasy, and Pandemics
“To Live and Love with a Dying World.” This conversation between Tim DeChristopher and Wendell Berry is quite good. Berry is a wily old fox, repeatedly refusing to be baited…
Good Work, CAFOs, and Pseudo Events
“Working Together.” Gracy Olmstead’s March newsletter relates the myriad benefits of working—and feasting—alongside friends. “Uyghurs for Sale.” Vicky Xiuzhong Xu, Danielle Cave, James Leibold, Kelsey Munro, and Nathan Ruser report…
Why Love Belongs in Politics
Lubbock, TX. One month ago, the Senate concluded the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump. The process was almost purely partisan: Republicans, who control the Senate, stymied Democrats’ attempts to…
Mobile Butchers, An Oily Bible, and Phytomining
“Eastern Kentucky Has Been Underwater, but You Probably Didn’t Notice.” Silas House writes about the flooding in Kentucky and the lack of attention it’s receiving: “When trouble comes to rural…
Proximity, Beauty, and the Craft of Farming
“The Distance from Our Food.” Benjamin Aldes Wurgaft makes a nuanced case for moving eating withing a circle of moral regard. In other words, eating animals and plants we know…
Local Culture 2.1
We're finalizing the next issue of Local Culture. Take a look at the cover and table of contents. If you subscribe by the end of February, you'll receive a copy…
2020 Conference Announcement
We've got a date, location, topic, and keynote speaker for the 2020 FPR conference. Save the date--September 26--and make plans to join us. We'll update the conference page with a…
Public Health, Decadence, and Replacing the Elite
“A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Colosseum.” James Matthew Wilson writes about the hope-giving state of American Catholic letters. “Warning: Chinese Authoritarianism is Hazardous to Your Health.”…
Groundhog Day, Apps, and Foie Gras
“America Needs a Miracle.” The first section of Andrew Sullivan’s musings, where he reflects on Ezra Klein’s Why We’re Polarized and Christopher Caldwell’s The Age of Entitlement, is balanced, nuanced, and quite insightful.…
Rivers, Bill Gates, and Hating Literature
“Rewilding Food, Rewilding Farming.” Vandana Shiva argues that we need to improve farming, not get rid of it: “The notion that high-tech ‘farm free’ lab food will save the planet…
Facial Recognition, Urban Dreams, and Rhetoric
“The Secretive Company That Might End Privacy as We Know It.” Kashmir Hill details the workings of a new facial recognition app for the New York Times. What could go wrong?…
Elites, Content Collapse, and Amish Outhouses
“Saving Democracy From the Managerial Elite.” Michael Lind has a new book coming out about the new class war (look for FPR’s review on Monday). The Wall Street Journal published an excerpt:…
Old Tractors, Social Media, and Idolatry
“Once it Comes Time.” Michael Adno narrates the life and work of the photographer William Christenberry: “The thread of memory applied to all his work in sculpture, painting, and photography.…
Nationalism, Ebooks, and Gertrude Himmelfarb
“Rich Lowry’s Nationalist Review.” Patrick Deneen extends the argument he made last summer at the National Conservatism Conference in a review essay of Lowry’s The Case for Nationalism: How It Made Us Powerful,…
The Farm Bill, Afghanistan, and Philanthropy
I hope you enjoy this week’s slate of essays. I’ll be taking a Christmas break the next two weeks, but look for the Water Dipper to reappear in January 2020.…
G.E.M. Anscombe, Climate Despair, and René Girard
“Untempted by the Consequences.” John Schwenkler has a rich essay on G.E.M. Anscombe in Commonweal. Her fierce fidelity to “doing the truth” makes her a valuable exemplar. “Motivated Reasoning, Part Gazillion.”…
FPR Year in Review
It's been a busy year in the virtual pages of FPR. Exciting things have been happening in what I believe is now called "meatspace"---we hosted our largest-ever conference celebrating the…
Chinese Surveillance, Class War, and a Land Tax
“Exposed: China’s Operating Manuals for Mass Internment and Arrest by Algorithm.” Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian reports on China’s sophisticated system of surveillance and detention of Uighurs: The classified intelligence briefings reveal the…