Beautiful Collection – Nagle and Picking Up

Twenty some years ago at New York University I met an engaging and super smart anthropologist, Robin Nagle. She had a reputation as a very good teacher (well-deserved) and I was carried away by her enthusiasm and curiosity. We started talking about her interests and she told me that she was fascinated by garbage. I…

Scott Nearing – Much to Admire, Less to Like

Scott Nearing was one of the most influential thinkers of the homestead movement. His book Living the Good Life, written with his wife Helen in 1954, marked a critical development in the concept of a sustainable lifestyle. The Nearings’ promotion of living simply from the land was no  post-WWII American anti-consumerism fad. Instead, it was the…

Neighborhoods and the Great American City

Chicago is a big and complicated city. As a newcomer, I read widely to get a better understanding of my new home. The staff at the Unabridged Bookstore, an independent in the Lakeview neighborhood, has organized a section filled with Chicago books, ranging from the coffee table variety to academic monographs. On that shelf with a…