"The predominance of women in genealogical communities is consistent with the literature on "kinkeeping," the term coined by Carolyn J. Rosenthal to describe how the practice of maintaining family ties -- through activities such as fostering communication between members or providing emotional and financial aid to them -- was a form of gendered labor. Genealogists can be seen as fulfilling the role of kinkeeper in their families. With genealogical practices of prior times and of today, kinkeeping involves the work of connecting past and present kin with purposeful narrative."
-- Alondra Nelson, The Social Life of DNA: Race, Reparations, and Reconciliation after the Genome
Saturday, November 3, 2018
Monday, September 17, 2018
all they'll know of life
The two men [Robert E Lee and Joe Johnston] fell silent, seemed to be both enjoying the faint sound of a harmonica, muffled sounds of men moving about, fragments of conversation, all sounds of an army at rest.
"Look out there, all over the camp. Even the card playing is quiet. This is no party. They're preparing for it, every man looking deep inside himself, asking the same questions, making his own peace."
Johnston took his hat off, held it in his hands, stared at it. "No one plans this, Robert. No one says, 'I'm going to join the Army so I can fight a war.' you and I have been doing this for what? Eighteen years? After awhile you never expect to see something like this. Some of these boys are straight out of the Point, class of 1846, going straight from the classroom to combat. What will that do to them? They'll see the Army very differently than you or I do, Robert. War might even become... normal to them. You and I, we have lives to go home to, families. This war will end, and we will go back to doing what we always did before. But those boys, their lives will never be the same. All they'll know about life is fighting a war. Peacetime could be very dull."
-- Jeff Shaara, Gone for Soldiers: A Novel of the Mexican-American War
"Look out there, all over the camp. Even the card playing is quiet. This is no party. They're preparing for it, every man looking deep inside himself, asking the same questions, making his own peace."
Johnston took his hat off, held it in his hands, stared at it. "No one plans this, Robert. No one says, 'I'm going to join the Army so I can fight a war.' you and I have been doing this for what? Eighteen years? After awhile you never expect to see something like this. Some of these boys are straight out of the Point, class of 1846, going straight from the classroom to combat. What will that do to them? They'll see the Army very differently than you or I do, Robert. War might even become... normal to them. You and I, we have lives to go home to, families. This war will end, and we will go back to doing what we always did before. But those boys, their lives will never be the same. All they'll know about life is fighting a war. Peacetime could be very dull."
-- Jeff Shaara, Gone for Soldiers: A Novel of the Mexican-American War
Sunday, August 26, 2018
"There was a time - not long ago - when Americans could honestly look their kids in the eye and promise they would enjoy a better life than their parents had. That was the essence of the American Dream, now receding into memory for many and at its moment of greatest peril."
- David Rolf, The Fight For $15
- David Rolf, The Fight For $15
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