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nickel and dimed: on (not) getting by in america
barbara ehrenreich
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I've wanted to read this book since it came out in May of 2001 but had a hard time getting it from the library because apparently every old lady in Wake County wanted to read it too. It's a slim book - 221 pages - so you should get through fast since you really can't put it down. The author decides to see if she can support herself working a series of unskilled jobs - waitress, maid, Wal-Mart employee, nursing home assistant - in different parts of the country. What ensues is a fascinating look at the American workforce today and the fact that you can't support yourself working these kinds of jobs. Do you ever go to a fast food place and wonder how people can work there? This book explores exactly that question. The author gets her co-workers stories and you find a vicious cycle: they have to work at the diner down the street because they don't have a car but they don't make enough money at the diner to get a car so they can't drive to get a better paying job in the next town over. When she works as a maid you find that maid services don't really clean your house as much as wipe it down. She also describes the three different kinds of shit she cleans in people's toilets and wonders if rich people are actually losing pubic hair faster than poor people (as evidenced by the condition of their bathrooms.) She offers lots of facts and figures about the poverty level, working class wages, etc., which will no doubt depress you as it did me. All in all, an amazing book that will make you thankful for whatever job you have that is paying you more than $6.50 an hour (sorry, Rich!)
This book is available in paperback. Read the first chapter and start cleaning your own damn house!
(reviewed by lisa) |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
April 2002 [link] |
recommend 3 thumbs up
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jesus, interrupted
bart ehrman
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First off, I think it's important to dismiss any of the common misunderstandings about Bart Ehrman and this book. The book is not a diatribe. It does not set out to debunk Christianity. Ehrman, in my opinion, is not angry, condescending, or uncaring in this book – quite the opposite, actually. Ehrman is not asking that you abandon your faith. I personally feel, having read the book, that Ehrman has served us up a wonderful tool, and has provided us with a great opportunity for discussion that could be very good for society at this point in time. It is also very important to understand that the book does not make any assertions that are new, radical, or unpopular among biblical scholars. And that is exactly what makes the book so incredibly fascinating, and quite honestly, shocking.
Ehrman is very clear from the get-go that he is not serving up anything that would be surprising to anyone who went through a non-evangelical seminary schooling. The assertions in Ehrman's book are something that most ministers and scholars of the New Testament have learned. They are things that have been agreed upon by the vast majority of biblical scholars. The only shocking part is that we, as a nation and a society so greatly influenced by the Bible, know so little about The Bible. We think we know a lot about it, and in many ways we do. We know the parables. We know, and can recite from memory, entire portions of scripture. We know the many characters, their many trials, and we know the great many lessons to be learned from The Bible. But those of us who claim we know our Bible – what do we really know? We tend to believe that it is the inerrant word of God. We view it as a book. We call it "The Good Book". We treat it as a package, a unit, as we do most other books we own.
The problem is that we do not approach the Bible from a historical-critical perspective. We do this with any other manuscripts or literature when we want to better understand it. Why do we not approach our most beloved text in the same way? We read each book in the Bible, but rarely do we compare narratives and note their striking theological and historical differences. We often do not take into account when each book was written, to whom, by whom, and for what reason(s). Mostly, this is due to the popular notion that it is God's book, and it is inerrant or divinely inspired and therefore its attributes are divine and universal. If we believe that, then we are not doing a very good job of reading.
Ehrman notes the phenomenon of compressing different narratives into one clean narrative – creating a narrative that cannot be found existing on its own in the Bible. He writes of our reluctance to read the books of the Bible horizontally – meaning comparing separate accounts of the same events in different books, rather than compiling aspects of each into one imagining. If we read the books of the Bible, Gospels or otherwise, horizontally, we notice how much of what we know about the Bible is contradictory, irreconcilable, historically incorrect, or theologically incompatible. He urges that in order to fully understand what each author is trying to say, we need to look at the details of each account – each author is using devices to make a theological point, a point that is lost when we create our own narratives from more than one account.
Here are some things, from Ehrman's book, that many of us do not know, or accept. And it is important to note that these are not simply Erhman's assertions, but are well-documented by Biblical scholars, and Ehrman provides a wealth of footnotes, and supporting information and bibliographies which he urges the reader to explore on their own. And that is one thing Ehrman does do – he urges the reader, on many occasions, to read your own Bibles and do your own research. These are only a few bullet items that I found really interesting – this only skims the surface of what the book has to offer.
• "Of the twenty-seven books of the New Testament, only eight almost certainly were written by the authors to whom they are traditionally ascribed: the seven undisputed letters of Paul and the Revelation of John" (which may not be the John most people believe it to be.)
• The other nineteen books fall into three groups: "Misattributed writings", "Homonymous writings" (written by someone who has the same name as someone else, i.e. James was most likely written by a James, but not written by Jesus' brother James – its reason for inclusion as scripture), and "Pseudepigraphic writings" (written in the names of people who did not actually write them – scholars have known this for over a century).
• "In Matthew, Jesus refuses to perform miracles in order to prove his identity; in John, that is practically the only reason he does miracles."
• "Jesus' disciples were "lower-class, illiterate, Aramaic-speaking peasants from Galilee." "The authors of the Gospels were highly educated, Greek-speaking Christians who probably lived outside Palestine."
• There exists a wealth of early Christian forgeries (Gospels allegedly written by Peter, Philip, Thomas, James the brother of Jesus. There were forged apostolic acts, "such as the Acts of John and of Paul and Thecla; we have epistles, such as the letter to the Laodiceans, 3 Corinthians, letters between Paul and the Roman philosopher Seneca, and letters allegedly written by Peter to James in order to oppose Paul; and we have a number of apocalypses, an Apocalypse of Peter (which nearly made it into the canon, and an Apocalypse of Paul". It is likely that forgeries could have made it into the canon.
• "This view that the New Testament contains books written under false names is taught at virtually all the major institutions of higher learning except strongly evangelical schools". "It is the view taught in all the major textbooks on the New Testament used in these institutions. It is the view taught in the seminaries and divinity schools. It is what pastors learn when they are preparing for ministry."
• The Gospels were likely written after the year 70. Between the time of Jesus and these writings, Christianity was spreading through major urban areas of the Mediterranean region, solely by word of mouth. The way to convert people away from their (mostly) pagan religions was to tell them stories about Jesus: what he said and did, and how he died and was raised from the dead. Word of mouth, in a world of no mass media. If you look at our own ability to create urban legends, exaggerate, or alter details in the age of information, it would be disingenuous to assume that in the decades of repeated oral histories of Jesus, details did not undergo changes before they were committed to paper.
• If Jesus lived and died in the first century, what do the Greek and Roman sources from his own day through the end of the century have to say about him? The answer is breathtaking. They have absolutely nothing to say about him. He is never discussed, challenged, attacked, maligned, or talked about in any way in any surviving pagan source of the period. There are no birth records, accounts of his trial and death, reflections on his significance, or disputes about his teachings...his name is never mentioned once in any pagan source. And we have a lot of Greek and Roman sources from the period: religious scholars, historians, philosophers, poets, natural scientists; we have thousands of private letters; we have inscriptions placed on buildings in public places. In no first-century Greek or Roman (pagan) source is Jesus mentioned."
• CS Lewis put forth the formulation that since Jesus called himself God, there were only three logical possibilities: he was either a liar, a lunatic, or the Lord. Ehrman states that "none of our earliest traditions indicates that Jesus said any such thing about himself. And surely if Jesus had really spent his days in Galilee and then Jerusalem calling himself God, all of our sources would be eager to report it." "Only in the latest of our Gospels", John, a Gospel that shows considerably more theological sophistication than the others, does Jesus indicate that he is divine." Perhaps Lewis's formula is flawed. Perhaps Jesus was actually "a first-century Palestinian Jew who had a message to proclaim other than his own divinity".
• The idea of the divine being becoming human was not introduced until the Gospel of John, written after the other three Gospels.
• There are "flat out discrepancies among the books of the New Testament. Sometimes these discrepancies could be reconciled if one worked hard enough at it with pious imagination; other times the discrepancies could not be reconciled, however fanciful the explanation." (i.e. Jesus dies on different days in Mark and John).
• "A whole range of theological perspectives came into existence, not during the life of Jesus, or even through the teachings of his original apostles, but later, as the Christian church grew and came to be transformed into a new religion rather than a sect of Judaism. These include some of the most important Christian doctrines, such as that of a suffering Messiah, the divinity of Christ, the Trinity, and the existence of heaven and hell."
These are only a few examples of items that I personally found fascinating (there scores more tidbits, inaccuracies, contradictions, and theological problems, that Ehrman details), and in some cases shocking. I grew up in the Methodist church. I was exposed to the Bible as much as your average Christian. Obviously I formed my own opinions, as we all do, in regards to the Bible's inerrancy, historical accuracy, etc. I took a few courses in college in which we studied the Bible from a historical critical perspective. These had a huge influence on my changing views of The Bible and of religion in general. Therefore, many of Erhman's assertions, opinions, and conclusions, did not come as a surprise. But the experience of reading "Jesus, Interrupted" is certainly eye-opening even for those who have been exposed to reading the Bible from the historical-critical perspective.
I understand the reluctance of many to read the book. I understand the knee-jerk reaction to Ehrman. Sure, anytime we are asked to truly examine our own long-held beliefs, we are hesitant. With these understandings, I would urge anyone who has any interest in the Bible to read the book. It is not meant to change your faith. It likely will, however, change aspects of your faith. Ehrman does is not stating there is no God. He is not stating that Jesus did not exist. He is not saying Jesus did not perform miracles or rise from the dead. There are some things we cannot know from historical critical research. That is where faith comes in. All Ehrman is urging is for us to allow ourselves to truly know and understand the human aspects of the New Testament. Why the Bible exists as it is, who wrote it, and why they wrote what they wrote. There are two texts that greatly affect us in our daily lives: The Bible and the Constitution. It is shocking that we know so little about how both came to be. It is up to us to make our own decisions about the things in it which we cannot prove or disprove. But we have no excuse for not exploring and understanding centuries of painstaking research on the most important text ever written. If Ehrman is not your cup of tea, there are numerous other books, and plenty of divinity programs serving it up in another form.
It's a fascinating read. Ehrman is a refreshing voice in non-fiction. He's incredibly knowledgeable, funny, and likeable, regardless of your religious views. I urge everyone, believers and non-believers, to spend some time with his writings. You will be challenged and you will learn a lot, no matter your background (okay, unless you've been through seminary school), and that's something that's rare in these days when we tend to live in ideological echo chambers. |
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reviewed by: ericS |
April 2009 [link] |
recommend
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heartburn
nora ephron
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| This ia semi-autobiography of a cooking book writer that discovers her husband is having an affair when she is 7 months pregnant with their second child. Apparently, this also happened to Ephron. This was originally published in 1974 and was a big hit with the New York and Washington crowds. Ephron went on to write the screenplay for When Harry Met Sally and she obvioulsy drew heavily from Heartburn - specific lines, scenes and characters are practically word for word. Recipes are intermingled with the text and offer a brief respite from the women-who-love-jerks theme. |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
February 2004 [link] |
recommend 3 thumbs up
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i feel bad about my neck
nora ephron
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Most of the essays in this collection are Ephron's witty take on getting older, especially on becoming a woman of a certain age and the steps woman take (or don't take) to combat age. Also included is a fabulous essay about reading a really great book, which Ephron likens to rapture and she lists several of her very favorite books including "The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay" and "The Woman in White". She also writes a great essay about real estate and love, part of which was printed in The New Yorker a while back. It's good.
I actually had the chance to listen to this on CD (read by Ephron) and it's a very delightful road trip companion. |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
May 2007 [link] |
recommend
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simple passion
annie ernaux
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| I looked everywhere for this book because it was just a phenomenon in France. It is about a woman who is obsessed with a man. I felt that I could really relate at the time I read this and was again anticipatory of a sister to sister book which would have me sobbing in unison with the narrator. Alas this book wasn't such a tale. If you like French moderne served with monotone style suffering, give this book a gander. I like it because it had nice scenery (as in France), but for better or for worse, by the end of the book, I was annoyed with the character thoroughly. On a side note, I've been told that being utterly annoyed with the main character can attest to the skill of the writer. While I won't refute anyone's thoughtful belief, I don't want to read or watch such characters. Just me. I need at least a touch of self-inflicted humor or something. |
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reviewed by: kristen |
September 2000 [link] |
recommend
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