daelnorwood

Or, The Axes of Ideology Don’t Just Split Hairs

Chopping

Sean Safford, one of the OrgHeads, has just put up a very astute post about movements in contemporary U.S. political ideology. Essentially, he thinks that the ideological axis in the U.S. has shifted away from an emphasis on “fairness” vs. “conservation” — CEO pay is far too high! 40 million are uninsured! v. the market works great! If it [institutions] ain’t broke don’t fix it!– to an emphasis on “sustainability.”

Here’s his description of the “sustainability” argument:

The argument goes something like this: We live in a highly interconnected society which operates within a series of interconnected systems. Resources (physical, material, social, and political) are not only scarce, they are extinguishable. The system is in place, not so much to keep social order, but to ensure the reproduction of the resources needed to reproduce society over time. Undermining any of the systems on which society depends threatens to have ripple effects on others. But importantly, the biggest threat to the system comes not from external threats, but from individuals acting in their own self interest in ways that could undermine the delicate balance on which interdependencies of the system depends. Government action is needed, not to ensure fairness, but in order to save us from ourselves.

Continue reading “Searching for Sustainable Sovereignty” →

Uncategorized

Only with Twelve Men, On the Outside of the Wall

June 12, 2009June 12, 2009 daelnorwood

Or, Now That’s some doux commerce

Those that know me IRL know that there’s no…way…I… could… resist. Sorry, sober scholarship will return tomorrow.

Our young readers may not feel much interest in ordinary wars, at best they are infringements of the laws of God and humanity; but a war with the empire of China, with whose inhabitants no intercourse has been allowed for centuries, except on the outside of the walls of the single city of Canton with only twelve men called Hong merchants, is a war of considerable novelty.

~”About the British Taking Chusan,” Parley’s Magazine (New York) January 1841, v9, p.64

Uh, that’s what she said?

This makes a bit more sense (or less?) if you know that Parley’s was a family magazine? And double entendres were still in beta, in France.

Now in Actual Work

China, the Sea, and the South

June 12, 2009June 18, 2009 daelnorwood

Or, Heathens All

earth

Rev. Joshua Leavitt,

Dear Sir, – I noticed in a recent number of the ‘Emancipator,’ a proposition to furnish gratuitously for a year, that paper to such clergymen as lectured and took up collections among their people, in the course of the year, for the Anti-Slavery Society.

My course of procedure, although it does not conform strictly to the letter of the proposition, yet, in fact, secures to the cause a greater amount of attention and effort, in my view, than would a solitary lecture in the course of the year.

At my monthly concert of prayer for the conversion of the world, which I hold on the Sabbath evening previous to the first Monday in each month, a distinct portion of time is allotted to the cause of the oppressed slave. I portion out to brethren distinct missionary grounds, with the understanding that each is to prepare himself with the latest information relative to his own station. One has, for instance, China; another Ceylon; another the Seamen’s cause; another that of American slavery: which last cause being in two zealous friends of the slave, has, I think according to their ability, due justice to it. Our custom is, that each cause shall be followed by addresses at the throne of grace in their behalf.

As to contributions, the frequent visits of your agents and those of the State Society does not suffer what he ave to give to remain long idle in our purses.

My object in this communication is two-fold, –1st. That of communicating my plans, believing, as I do, that there are many brethren who might introduce it with profit to their people, and with little or no opposition. I think it profitable, as it brings the subject up for serious meditation more than it would be in any other way, unless a distinct concert is held for the slave. And further, the subject is brought before the minds of many that would not attend an anti-slavery concert or a regularly announced anti-slavery lecture.

If you agree with me in sentiment, you may be able to concoct a brief paragraph on the subject that will, I think, be useful. Or you can use such portions of this letter as you please, if you will leave blank my name and the date.

My second object in this communication is, to request that if my measures come up to the spirit of your proposition, in your view, you will please forward to me the Emancipator.

Yours, &c.,

~”Another Response from a Minister,” The Emancipator and Free American (New York), 8 August 1839, p. 58

Once you get past the overcrowded syntax here, this is a fascinating letter. While I’ve certainly heard of church groups convening to hear a lecture on slavery, or about happenings in the mission fields, it never occurred to me that the two would be grouped together in this way. Never mind how Chautauqua this is. Can you imagine hearing a sermon, and then getting a regular news round-up like this?

The list of topics that the good reverend assigns his parishioners – China, Ceylon, Seamen’s Bethels, American slavery – is a great reminder of the wonderful scope of Jacksonian evangelicals’ interests. A bit less happily, it reaffirms who’s at the edges of their world: people far away, people from home but of a radically different occupational class, and people who are property.

And, while I don’t think this is sufficient cause to give interest in missionary endeavors the same weight as the anti-slavery movement (I don’t think it would be wrong to say that missionary news reached a wider audience in anti-slavery newspapers like the Emancipator, rather than in missionary-only magazines like the Missionary Herald), it’s certainly a good indicator of the frame, or frames, within which such news was received. I do wonder if slavery is the controlling metaphor here, or if it’s something bigger about Christian civilization and the perfecting of society.

Thoughts, as always, welcome.

Image cite: Woodleywonderworks, “Earth, courtesy Apollo 17, and probably the most reproduced image of all time,” Flickr, CC License

The Past is a Foreign...Something

FYI, Pt. 2

June 11, 2009 daelnorwood

Or, Running Hot and Cold

Bible

Regarding that earlier notice, some helpful advice from the Barre Gazette (Barre, MA), 9 August 1839, p. 2.

When the paralysis of the stomach takes place from drinking ice water, a teaspoon of cayenne in a cup of hot water, repeated every twenty or thirty minutes, will subdue the chills and restore perspiration.

Also, in the same column:

Perhaps they had better do it know. [sic] In old times, when editors were short of matter for their papers, they used to fill them up with a chapter or two from the Bible.

Indeed.

Image cite: Eye2Eye, “Old Bible,” Flickr, CC License

History and Historians, Ivory Towers

O Historians!

June 11, 2009June 20, 2009 daelnorwood

How Crafty? So Crafty

Duke it Out
Remember when we were talking about how crafty historians are?* Well, other, smarter people have been having the same great idea. Let me fill you in…

Michèle Lamont, author of How Professors Think, has been guest-blogging over at Crooked Timber, and in between trolling the philosophers**, she’s got a post up comparing the cultures of evaluation amongst historians and economists. Her discussion is not much different than the previous bit in the Chronicle of Higher Ed, but the comments are worth a whirl, if only to massage our collective disciplinary egos. My favorite so far is this:

“But—in my limited experience with them—I also think historians respect a strong, clear writing style … That stylistic aspect of the particular craft ethic would also further buttress skepticism about theory per se, etc.

Oh, you — little ole us, concerned with narrative and skeptical of theory? Too kind, too kind. But now we’re blushing.***

The economists … come off less well; almost as poorly as the philosophers, in fact. Apparently an intense devotion to mathematical formalism and the appearance of rudeness don’t win you friends among sociologists and political theorists. Who knew?

In a related story, now economists are admitting that what they do is really sociology. Arguments about how useful a rigidly quantitative approach to human life is aside, I would say this is an example of irony trending toward self-parody. Who else but a practitioner of a relentlessly colonizing system of thought, known for their naive working assumptions and bold claims about eternal human nature, could be startled by the fact that the field’s mission-creep means that it’s started to occupy ground already well-tilled by others? I expect soon they’ll be announcing that they’ve invented a form of punctured spheroid that can be attached to an axle for easier locomotion.

* Also: man, I’ve been at this about 3X longer than I thought I would be
** Which, incidentally is a great name for a prog rock band.
*** At least I am; though nothing in the post or comments settles the debate over whether its historians’ writing or evidentiary care that make for their craft. My impression from the comments — the one I’ve cited aside — is that these folks mean we value our evidence and argument, not coruscating verbiage.

Image cite: Okinawa Soba, “Two Award-Winning Flickr Photographers Duke It Out,” Flickr, CC License