January 13--Today I did shelf readings from 291 WATTS (as in Alan) to 306.874 SELFISH. But I did it backwards, starting with 306 (Culture and Institutions) and going back to 291 (Currently “Unassigned” but once designated Comparative Religion). Clearly I need to learn what the exact Dewey decimal numbers mean since (((Semitism))): Being Jewish in America in the Age of Trump by Jonathan Weisman was 305.892 but Antisemitism Here and Now by Deborah Lipstadt was 305.8924—what does that extra 4 mean? Interesting finds of the day included two books by Bill McKibben, one by Gloria Alzadúa, two hard copies of Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Between the World and Me (not to mention that there are two holds on the audio version), an old copy of Albert Camus The Rebel, that has the same kind of cover as the reprints of The Plague, the 50th Anniversary edition of Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique, and Manning Marable’s biography of Malcolm X—unfortunately catalogued with Muslim biographies rather than in the black history or civil rights sections.
I also found two books by Rebecca Solnit (the library has at least a half dozen), most famous for Men Explain Things to Me. A frequent contributor to Harper’s Magazine, Solnit coined the term "man’splaining." The reason I mention this is that we knew her way back when—she wrote articles for the Citizen Alert newspaper that Mac edited when we lived in Reno, Nevada in the 1980s. I don’t think you can say he gave Solnit her start, but we like to think he contributed to the launch. . . You have to ask yourself why the Kama Sutra is sandwiched between bell hooks’ All About Love and Robert Fulghum’s True Love. Fulghum is better known as the author of All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten. (Side Note: This was the text adopted by the governor of Wisconsin in the address he gave at my graduation from Marquette University in 1996. I’m sure I wasn’t the only graduate wondering why she'd just spent all that time and money if Fulghum, and the governor, were correct.) You can see that shelf reading offers the opportunity to free associate in any number of directions. I thought that economics was the dismal science, but the 300s in general are all about strife and struggle: slavery, oppression, crisis, aging, and worse. The future is especially grim--Lean Logic: A Dictionary for the Future and How to Survive it; Hot: Living Through the Next Fifty Years on Earth; Countdown: Our Last, Best Hope for a Future on Earth? ; The Uninhabitable Earth. The optimistically-titled Abundance: the Future is Better than You Think hardly matters, once you’ve waded through the others. Most interesting titles of the day: How to Fall in Love with Anyone and I Am Not A Slut. Those are two separate books, by the way. Most interesting call numbers: 305.4201 BITCH (The Bitch is Back) and, as illustrated, 305.4209 NASTY (Nasty Women). BITCH is not quite as interesting as it sounds, since the subtitle is Older, Wiser and (Getting) Happier. But Nasty Women is subtitled Feminism, Resistance, and Revolution in Trump’s America. Now that’s more like it! Comments are closed.
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Author Rebecca Moore is Professor Emerita of Religious Studies at San Diego State University. She is currently Reviews Editor for Nova Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions and Co-Director of The Jonestown Institute. Archives
December 2021
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