search for books and compare prices
Tables of Contents for Readings for the 21st Century
Chapter/Section Title
Page #
Page Count
Preface
xix
 
American Culture at the End of the Twentieth Century
1
46
Style and Substance in the Shape of Things to Come
The Past as Prologue
A Eulogy for the Twentieth Century
2
5
Tom Wolfe
A novelist and one of the inventors of ``New Journalism'' characterizes the twentieth century and speculates about the future. ``The Great Relearning---if anything so prosaic as remedial education can be called great---should be thought of not as the end of the twentieth century but the prelude to the twenty-first.''
Box of Babel?
7
10
Charles Oliver
Unlike other critics of American television, Charles Oliver sees the medium as essentially varied---although he wonders whether or not this might be a good thing for our society. For most of our TV history, Oliver points out, there were only three or four choices; soon, our choices may number in the hundreds. What will be the result?
Questions for Commercials
17
8
Leslie Savan
Everyone knows that commercials are meant to influence us. But how often do we bother to understand how they work? Media critic Leslie Savan argues in this essay that advertisers are so wired in to our culture that they often tell us far more about ourselves than they do about our culture.
Who Will Weep for Tupac?
25
6
Herbert Daughtry
When rapper Tupac Shakur was shot dead in 1996, a national controversy erupted over the meaning of his life and death. In this essay, the pastor of Shakur's home church speaks a eulogy for a man he knew for most of his young life, and for whom ``Tupac Shakur'' was an individual and a man before he was a rapper and a social issue.
No More Tupacs 4 Us
31
3
Florida M'Tumi Wilcox
For Florida M'Tumi Wilcox, a freelance writer involved in community affairs, Tupac may have been a fine person and his death a terrible tragedy, but the legacy he leaves behind may lead other young people on the same road Tupac traveled---a road that ends in the tomb, prematurely and unnecessarily.
Splinters to the Brain
34
4
Oliver Stone
The Academy Award-winning director of Platoon, Born on the Fourth of July, Natural Born Killers, and Wall Street discusses the responsibilities of the artist to society. Is it the artist's role to reassure or to shock? And is subversion by definition harmful to society? Stone defends his art and describes what he considers the role of movies today to be.
On ``Junk Food for the Soul'': In Defense of Rock and Roll
38
8
Frank Zappa
A famous rock artist defends music against the attacks of author Allan Bloom. Has rock killed American music and perverted the tastes of its fans? Or are performers and their music only a ``comment'' on American society? Or are they some third thing, outside of the debate about ``American Values?''
Making Connections
46
1
American Life in the Information Age
47
46
The Cybersociety of Tomorrow
The Past as Prologue
from Media and the American Mind
48
4
Daniel Czitrom
Before anybody ever heard of the Internet (let alone the World Wide Web), or for that matter before radio and television were even thought of, Americans grappled with the ways in which the first electronic communications technology---the telegraph---could change their lives. Daniel Czitrom, a historian at Mount Holyoke College, describes how.
Thinking Outside the Mailbox
52
5
Heather Havrilesky
New technologies give us new ways to communicate---and new ways to miscommunicate! In this essay, humorist Heather Havrilesky looks at some of the strange behavior patterns that e-mail has engendered. The technology may exist to make our lives different, Havrilesky seems to say, but as long as we are who we are, e-mail won't be any better than the people who use it.
Y2K: The Year the Computers Strike Back
57
6
Mark K. Anderson
Although it received less publicity than the hurricanes, asteroids, and earthquakes to which it was routinely compared, the Y2K or Year 2000 problem was the greatest fear of a growing number of citizens in America. They felt that when January 1, 2000, rolled around, thousands of computers would start misbehaving, and no one could say what the consequences of that would be. It might be an inconvenience or it might be the end of the world as we know it. Mark K. Anderson looks into a disaster no one seemed to be able to stop.
The Internet in Black and White
63
3
Dejuan Walker
As the chorus of futuristic huzzas for the cyberspace era increases in volume, few people seem to have noticed who is left out of the virtual community. As DeJuan Walker notes, computers generally belong to middle-class white people, and cyberspace tends to be something of a country club. But didn't the Internet promise colorblindness and borderless communication? Walker thinks otherwise.
Is There a There in Cyberspace?
66
8
John Perry Barlow
Cyberspace, the imaginary realm where all computer transactions take place, is seen by many as representing a ``new frontier,'' a place where people of many different backgrounds can, invisible to each other, form a virtual community. But according to John Perry Barlow---former rancher, author of Grateful Dead songs, and cyberspace pioneer---cyberspace may turn out to be a dead end after all.
Babes in the Net
74
4
Sadie Plant
Sadie Plant, a British writer, looks at cyberspace from the point of view of an oppressed group. In ``Babes in the Net,'' Plant discusses some of the liberating aspects of the medium for women.
from Silicon Snake Oil
78
4
Clifford Stoll
Despite their misgivings, most of the writers who have essayed the topic of cyberspace have accepted the premise that it will change our culture and bring some great benefits whatever its drawbacks. Clifford Stoll, a noted science writer, disagrees. For Stoll, we have all been sold a bill of goods; the Internet is far from what it is cracked up to be, and has a negligible effect on our lives. Or at least, a negligible positive effect.
Telelearning: The Multimedia Revolution in Education
82
9
William E. Halal
Jay Leibowitz
The basic instruments of learning have always been the same: pen, pencil, blackboard, and chalk. The authors, both professors at George Washington University, argue that the time has come to seize electronic technology to ``revolutionize'' the way American children are taught to read, write, and be citizens of the twenty-first century.
Making Connections
91
2
Ecology for the Twenty-First Century
93
36
You and the Earth of Tomorrow
The Past as Prologue
Silent Spring: A Fable for Our Time
94
4
Rachel Carson
In this reading subtitled ``A Fable for Our Time,'' a pioneer environmentalist describes a happy town that is destroyed by environmental catastrophe. Whether this is mere fable or a prophecy for our own country is something we have yet to find out.
Ecology: The New Sacred Agenda
98
4
Albert Gore, JR.
The Vice President of the United States under Bill Clinton describes what he sees as the most important issue facing us today: ecology. Without a faith in ecology, he contends, there can be no faith in the future. Practical solutions need to be found, and they need to be pursued with faith and vigor.
In the Jungle
102
6
Annie Dillard
An American writer tells of her trip to a remote river in South America, and asks, ``Remote from what?'' There are aspects to life in the rain forest that might teach us a valuable lesson, and that we ignore at our own expense. Seen from the point of view of the inhabitants, it is we who are remote---from nature.
Seven Doomsday Myths about the Environment
108
9
Ronald Bailey
Is the environment as threatened as it is made out to be? According to Ronald Bailey, writing in Forbes Magazine, much of what you hear are ``myths'' not supported by the facts. Bailey presents seven of these and their refutations in this optimistic article.
Not So Fast
117
6
Bill Mckibben
Don't open the champagne yet, says this essay. Unlike Bailey, naturalist Bill McKibben, although encouraged by the progress made in the past twenty years, sees the environmental crisis as still that: a crisis. Congratulations on having deterred it are misplaced, he says; at best we have slowed our progress toward irrevocable environmental damage.
Reforest the Earth!
123
4
Norman Myers
What can we do about global warming? Drastic measures need to be taken---yet they are easy to plan and can be implemented. A senior fellow of the World Wildlife Fund says that ``a campaign to reforest the earth will stabilize rising temperatures'' and buy us time.
Making Connections
127
2
Careers for the Twenty-First Century
129
42
The Workplace of the Future
The Past as Prologue
Starting out in Business
130
5
Benjamin Franklin
The quintessential self-made man, Benjamin Franklin is the symbol of what America stood for in the half century before the revolution: hard work, ingenuity, and thrift, unbound by the closed doors and social rigidity of the Old World. In this selection from his Autobiography, Franklin describes the circumstances behind his owning his own printer's shop.
Internment Camp
135
7
Jim Frederick
More and more often young people are finding themselves working hard for nothing, all so that they can have all-important resume material. But what does such unpaid servitude do to the labor market? If people want to work for free, what does that mean for the rest of us, who can't afford to? And even if you can work for free, should you have to? Jim Frederick looks at interns as a fact of economic life in the twenty-first century.
The End of Labor
142
4
Tom Frank
Like Jim Frederick, Tom Frank has taken a long look at labor conditions at the end of the century, and finds them sorely lacking. His problem is not with working conditions, however, or (like Frederick) businesses who get what they don't pay for. In this essay, Frank discusses the public's consciousness of organized labor and how far it has fallen, both in sympathy and as an important fact of public life.
The War on Sexual Harassment: Protection or Witch-Hunt?
146
5
Cathy Young
What is sexual harassment? If you don't know what it is, can you still be guilty of it? Can anybody ruin a career or blacken a reputation just by pointing a finger? Political essayist Cathy Young takes a hard look at the confusion surrounding charges of sexual harassment in the workplace and attempts to point a way out that will protect real victims while still making legal and moral sense.
Dining with Cannibals
151
3
``POP''
In this postindustrial cry from the heart, an anonymous Silicon Valley computer designer writes of the evils of exploiting nerds. In a sustained diatribe, ``Pop'' gives his reason for quitting a job in which every human value has been sacrificed to the bald-faced greed of executives who wouldn't know a computer if it stood up in their soup.
Sub-Middle Management Worksick Blues
154
5
``Lotte Absence''
On the other side of the Silicon Valley coin, ``Lotte Absence,'' another anonymous writer, tells of being a manager at an up-and-coming web site and having been caught between do-nothing, egocentric, childish employees and zombielike executives. Like Pop, Lotte Absence also has reached the breaking point, and calls it quits in the face of overwhelming stupidity and indifference.
Will America Choose High Skills or Low Wages?
159
10
Ira Magaziner
Hillary Rodham Clinton
The First Lady from 1992 to 2000 and a fellow public policy expert put forward a plan to restore American competitiveness. It may not be easy, but it must be done, according to Magaziner and Clinton. Countries such as Germany and Japan, they argue, have jumped ahead of us because of their well-trained (and well-paid) workforce. America could do the same, and the authors explain how in specific detail.
Making Connections
169
2
Human Life and Human Technology
171
50
Medical Issues for the Twenty-First Century
The Past as Prologue
1933 Medicine
172
9
Lewis Thomas
A famous physician describes the state of the art medicine when he was trained early in the twentieth century. For example, curing disease played a very small part in a doctor's career only a generation or two ago. When antibiotics first appeared, the whole medical profession was transformed.
Fatalist Attraction
181
5
Virginia Postrel
As medical technology extends farther and farther into the oncesacred mysteries of our being, a backlash of controversy surrounds its advances. When a Scottish geneticist cloned a sheep named Dolly in 1996, it was the occasion for soul-searching and breast-beating the world over. But in this essay by Virginia Postrel, the needs of science to improve human life overweigh all mere metaphysics.
Beyond Prozac
186
6
Peter Jaret
A new ``wonder drug'' entered the American consciousness during the mid-1990s: Prozac, a mood elevator and antidepressant par excellence, which seemed to carry with it the promise of happiness finally delivered once and for all in a neat blue pill. The science writer Peter Jaret, however, finds these claims somewhat dubious.
What Are You, on Drugs?
192
4
Greg Beato
The appearance of so-called smart drugs in the 1990s gave dumb people a reason to hope that intelligence might come in a capsule. Humorist and social critic Greg Beato looks at the confidence game he believes these drugs to be, compares them to their patent medicine forebears, and points out some of the ironies involved in the sale of smart drugs on the World Wide Web.
from Prescription Medicide
196
5
Jack Kevorkian
``Dr. Death,'' the Michigan pathologist famous for his euthanasia campaign, has often been in the papers defending the right of suffering people to a painless, physician-assisted suicide. The good doctor's case has seldom been more fully stated than in his 1991 book Prescription Medicide, from which this selection is taken. Kevorkian makes his case for boldness and compassion in the face of a hidebound and hypocritical medical establishment.
The Gene Dream
201
10
Natalie Angier
Scientists are mapping our complete genetic code, a venture that will revolutionize medicine---and ethics. What is the goal and what will reaching it mean for the rest of us? A freelance writer follows the developing story.
When Is a Mother Not a Mother?
211
9
Katha Pollitt
With advances in the science of fertility, surrogate motherhood is becoming more and more available---to those who can afford it. Katha Pollitt looks at some of the issues involved when one woman can use another woman's body to bear a child. Freedom, class, and law all enter a new zone of ethics.
Making Connections
220
1
Feminine Gender---Future Tense
221
40
Women's Issues for the Twenty-First Century
The Past as Prologue
The Solitude of Self
222
7
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
One of the pioneers of modern feminism addresses a question she feels precedes even the matter of whether women should be given their rights: What is a woman's responsibility to herself as an individual? In one of her most well-remembered speeches, Elizabeth Cady Stanton presents feminism as an existential creed.
It's a Jungle Out There, So Get Used to It!
229
6
Camille Paglia
The war between men and women is heating up. One reason, suggests cultural critic Camille Paglia, is the effect of academic feminism on young women. Is sexual behavior really taught to us by society? In this essay, Paglia describes what she sees as a struggle against male nature in which young women have been dangerously handicapped by idealistic philosophies.
Whose Hype?
235
4
Susan Faludi
Date rape is a topic very much in the news, with an alleged school of ``victimization'' receiving much criticism from the (male) press. Feminist Susan Faludi, the author of Backlash, points out some of the fallacies with these ``debunkers.''
Why Mothers Should Stay Home
239
10
Deborah Fallows
A former full-time college administrator with a Ph.D. in linguistics argues that the choice is not to be either a career woman or a dumb housewife. In proposing a ``radical middle'' position, she finds that the stereotypes of each extreme do less than justice to the needs of women in contemporary life.
Feminism---It's a Black Thang!
249
4
Bell Hooks
One of America's most celebrated African American social critics takes on a paradox of our times: Why has feminism found so little support among blacks, who know so well what oppression is about? In this essay, taken from Essence magazine, bell hooks gives a call to arms for the feminist cause and makes some unexpected connections.
Shake the Universe
253
6
Madeleine L'Engle
The prolific novelist and author of the classic science fiction novel A Wrinkle in Time (1962) discusses the feminine gender in its largest context: that of the world and the universe. World history, the culture of violence, and the intergenerational solidarity of women are but a few of the topics this polymath touches upon.
Making Connections
259
2
American Education for the Twenty-First Century
261
46
Learning the Unlearning for the Future
The Past as Prologue
Learning to Read and Write
262
7
Frederick Douglass
For Frederick Douglass, born into slavery before the Civil War, learning to read and write was neither a chore nor a child's game. It was a task of deadly importance, carried out in danger and secrecy. It eventually allowed him to forge papers that would help him to escape and become the greatest of all abolitionist writers and orators, but first he had to learn the very basics. This selection is from his famous Autobiography (1845).
Linked Up for Learning
269
8
Bill Gates
Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft and the richest man in America, believes for obvious reasons that the Internet will be one of the richest and most transformative resources education has ever seen, changing its very nature and helping students all over the world learn more and communicate better. Unlike Neil Postman, whose essay follows, Gates believes that technology will change students, and he gives some of his reasons in this excerpt from The Road Ahead.
from The End of Education
277
8
Neil Postman
The electronic blessings of the Internet may well have a beneficial effect on education, as some of technology's proponents such as Bill Gates might have it. But Neil Postman, professor of communications at New York University and a noted skeptic on the subject of wired education, thinks otherwise. Who are the students that will use the Internet? And why will they use it as predicted? Postman answers these and other questions in this excerpt from his book The End of Education.
Dumbing Down
285
4
Robin Marantz Henig
When you went to school, were there separate classes organized on the basis of performance? Traditionally, most American schools had some kind of ``college prep'' route for the best students, as well as ``business,'' and ``vocational'' tracks for slower students. Did this system perpetuate social inequalities? Maybe, says Robin Marantz Henig, but holding the best students ransom to the worst isn't any better an idea.
Blowing Up the Tracks
289
8
Patricia Kean
Unlike Robin Marantz Henig, Patricia Kean thinks that ``tracking,'' as she calls it, is a more or less unmitigated social evil. Who decides what track a child is put in? And according to what criteria? Kean writes an attack on the practice of tracking, pointing out the extent to which an entire adult life can be formed by arbitrary bureaucratic decisions.
Education---Less of It!
297
9
Tertius Chandler
Formal education should not be taken for granted as a requirement for meeting the future---especially if today's young people really want to meet the goals higher education is fond of praising. A highly educated man argues against education.
Making Connections
306
1
The Millennial Melting Pot
307
38
Race and Equality in America's Future
The Past as Prologue
The Ballot or the Bullet
308
5
Malcolm X
Another martyr for American civil rights, Malcolm X took a perspective different from Martin Luther King's---one that speaks as eloquently for its refusal to speak in lofty terms. In this classic speech, the fiery activist addresses the participation of blacks in the political process. Unlike King, however, Malcolm X does not see a dream: ``I see an American nightmare.''
``What Then Is an American?''
313
3
Ali Ahmad
For Ali Ahmad, the son of Pakistani immigrants, the fact of being homosexual is as much a conflict as the more obvious one of being an American. In this essay, Ahmad addresses the old question of what it means to be an American from no less than four different perspectives: Pakistani, gay, American, and student of American identity.
The Arc of the Moral Universe Is Long, but It Bends toward Justice
316
5
Maya Angelou
The beating of Rodney King in 1992 started a firestorm of racial reaction. But what will the effect of all the violence and debate be? What are the factors informing the conflict, and why has so little headway been made? In this essay, the celebrated poet Maya Angelou describes the dynamics of racism: how we know, what we know, and what we must do about it.
Mother Tongue
321
7
Amy Tan
If America is becoming a truly multicultural society, the concept of a ``standard American English'' becomes more and more tenuous. And our language may gain as a result. Novelist Amy Tan gives an example from her own experience. Chinese American life, says Tan, revolves in many ways around the hybrid or ``broken'' English spoken in the home. In ``Mother Tongue,'' Amy Tan explains how her mother's language helped to teach her how to write.
Barrio Boy
328
4
Ernesto Galarza
Not all Americans have adapted easily. In this memoir of life in the Sacramento (California) barrio, or Mexican ghetto, Ernesto Galarza paints a portrait of strangers in a strange land. Without a knowledge of American language or culture, Galarza and his people were isolated, a pocket of Mexican culture smuggled over the border. The experience of an immigrant child is pointedly rendered in this selection from Galarza's autobiography Barrio Boy.
Tribes and Tribulations
332
6
Jennifer Juarez Robles
The difficulty of being one minority in America has been discussed by a number of authors in this book, but what of the plight of being two? Jennifer Juarez Robles considers the case of homosexual Native Americans---and describes how in one case, the difficulty of one minority position may be absorbed into the positive side of another one.
America as a Collage
338
6
Ryzsard Kapuscinski
Does Los Angeles---now ``America's largest Third World city''---foretell our future social fabric? For example, eighty-one languages, few of them European, are now spoken in the city's elementary school system. What will the city (and the country) come to look like? An international investigative reporter makes his prediction.
Making Connections
344
1
Social Issues Present and Future
345
48
``Keeping It Real'' in The New Century
The Past as Prologue
The Fear of the Past
346
5
G. K. Chesterton
Why do we put such faith in the future and its untried solutions as an answer to our current problems? That was the question the English essayist G. K. Chesterton put to himself in the early years of the twentieth century. For Chesterton, we think about the future because, we are afraid of the past. The past is too filled with rivals, with ideas we find threatening, with figures we find intimidating. For Chesterton, then, futurism was a form of flight, a kind of imaginative cowardice. Have things changed?
A Confederacy of Complainers
351
7
Pete Hamill
American morals have changed much over 225 years, and no doubt they will continue to change. But for New York newspaper columnist Pete Hamill, they are changing for the worse because no one, on any level of society, any longer considers him- or herself responsible for anything. This is the age of the victim, according to Hamill, and it is poisoning every level of American society. Will ``it's not my fault!'' be the motto of our country in the years to come?
Keeping to Our Own Kind
358
4
Tim Cavanaugh
A similar malaise bothers social observer Tim Cavanaugh. Written during the great Wall Street boom of the late 1990s, this essay looks at the same America Tom Frank laments in ``The End of Labor.'' In the new America, people seem to have given up on the idea of a classless society, and people who lead secure lives have become all too comfortable in their willingness not to mix with the lower orders. With an acerbic irony, Cavanaugh relates his own experience as a writer and former ``pool doctor'' to the problem.
The Case for Sex Work
362
5
Silja Talvi
No matter how far into the future we go, ``the world's oldest profession'' will go with us. So is it time to adopt the progressive position of some European countries and legalize ``sex work'' once and for all? Extending the term to include go-go dancing and other variants of the job, Silja Talvi looks at the growing support for legitimizing a profession that still dares not speak its name---or organize a union.
Not in My Backyard! The Waste-Disposal Crisis
367
8
Ted Peters
One cost of modern civilization is the production of noxious or toxic waste. But already many states are running out of landfill sites. What should we do about a problem that will affect everyone's life by the year 2350? A theologian proposes an answer.
The Code of the Universe
375
8
James A. Haught
What could be more inspiring of religious awe than the apparent meaningful organization of the universe itself? An award-winning journalist reports on Einstein's religious views and his own search for meaning in the beauty of scientific knowledge.
Liberty, Quality, Machinery
383
9
Aldous Huxley
A pioneer science-fiction writer and social critic speculates on the future and makes a classic statement about relations between technology and the quality of human life. The salvation of cultural quality may begin with the humble triumphs of the lowly do-it-yourselfer.
Making Connections
392
1
Rhetorical Index
393
6
Author Index
399