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A carregar... Dark Age Aheadpor Jane Jacobs
   Ainda não há conversas na Discussão sobre este livro.   ) bloftin2 | May 4, 2023 |  I liked it. Hence the three stars. I didn't quite love it. Not because of any lack of good information and ideas or a lack of quality writing, but more because I wanted it to be a little more riled up. A bit more emotional. It was very straightforward and even, which is perfectly commendable but doesn't get my blood flowing. Jacobs basically claims that North America (the U.S. and Canada, that is) is teetering dangerously close on the brink of sliding into a Dark Age. She cites five major reasons why: the continuing degradation of community and family, our higher education system, misuse of science and technology, governmental representation that has become disconnected from local needs, and the failure of self-regulation of the learned professions. I found all the points really intriguing, with quite a number of viewpoints offered that I hadn't before heard or considered. Her talk of the degradation of community and family was a great section, not focusing on ranting moralistic concerns so much as on the ever-worsening economic brutalities that households face while trying to support themselves, as well as the destruction of community (in its most holistic sense) brought about by those economic hardships as well as poor planning practices. For instance, she takes suburban design to task. Again, this is not in some kind of moralistic view in which she proclaims suburbs evil, but rather she simply points out the ways in which thought-processes behind their planning have been terribly misguided and destructive, often leading to neighborhoods that lack any real sense of community. Her taking to task of most of the universities in North America was also quite compelling. It comes across as a somewhat more dispassionate version of [a:Wendell Berry|8567|Wendell Berry|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1209652700p2/8567.jpg]'s arguments in [b:Life Is a Miracle: An Essay Against Modern Superstition|76732|Life Is a Miracle An Essay Against Modern Superstition|Wendell Berry|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1236228896s/76732.jpg|74220], although the substance of the arguments do have their differences, as well. Still, she quite convincingly argues that universities have become little more than credentialing agencies, rather than institutions that work to create fully formed human beings via comprehensive education (that fosters and creates the ability of critical and independent thought) and mentoring. Those are just a few of the intriguing arguments Jacobs makes in the book, and if they sound interesting, I certainly would recommend reading it. I perhaps prefer this sort of information to come to me via a more agitated voice--someone railing, though ideally not to the degree of incoherence. That Dark Age Ahead doesn't come in that exact voice is no condemnation of it as a fine bit of writing. Hell, for some, it's probably a much more palatable approach to a topic that can easily become very emotionally charged. For me, I would have preferred a bit more Berry-type anger. But then, I have Berry for that. Jacobs fulfills her own niche quite nicely. ( ) joel.caris | Jun 26, 2020 |  ) snash | Mar 11, 2020 | ) bibliosk8er | Aug 16, 2018 | Jacobs takes us through a discussion of various Dark Ages and how they resulted in a cultural amnesia into a dissection of five pillars that show signs of a coming Dark Age and finally into a prescription for forestalling this. The five pillars are: 1. Community and family 2. Higher education 3. Science and technology 4. Governmental representation 5. Self-governing professions Although I can’t speak authoritatively about any of these pillars I do know a little bit more about science and technology than the others. Jacobs describes the way the scientific process works better than anyone else I have ever read. At page 69 she says “In sum, the scientific state of mind works along two slightly different avenues, one abstract, the other feeling its way more concretely and pragmatically. Both approaches demand integrity, awareness of evidence and respect for it, and attention to new questions that arise as immediate practical problems to be grappled with, or else as more abstract and postponable. Both avenues are valid and effective. They work together so well that they frequently shift back and forth in the course of an investigation or they overlap.” She then goes on to say “If a body of enquiry becomes disconnected from the scientific state of mind, that unfortunate segment of knowledge is no longer scientific.” She cites three examples of supposed scientific thinking that became disconnected from the scientific state of mind. The fact that she saw this as an issue in 2003, long before the Harper Government started to wage its war on science strikes me as remarkably prescient. The federal government has muzzled its own scientists and attacked non-governmental science groups with everything from audits to lies. If Jacobs was as correct about her other arguments as she was about science and technology then we are probably further down the road to a Dark Age than we were a decade ago. Let us hope we are not too late to unwind the vicious spiral (the title of Chapter Seven). (  )1  gypsysmom | Sep 3, 2014 |
Released in 2004 when she was 88 years old, Dark Age Ahead is hardly talked about among urbanists and fans of Jacobs’ earlier works. In fact, it was widely panned as the work of an aging crank whose best days and smartest commentary were behind her. Back in 2004, before the economic crisis, urbanists were celebrating the resurgence of the city. We didn’t think much about the rise of conservative populists like Trump or the late Rob Ford. But there was Jane Jacobs, arguing “caution” against a new dark age lurking right around the corner. In Dark Age, Jacobs focused on the erosion of the key pillars of stable, democratic societies—the decline of the family, the rise of consumerism and hyper-materialism, the transformation of education into credentialism, the undermining of scientific norms, and the take-over of politics by powerful special interest groups, among others. Persistent racism, worsening crime and violence, the growing gap between the rich and poor, and increasing divides between the winners and losers of globalization provided growing evidence of the decay of society, she argued. At the very center of Jacobs’ work, I have come to believe, lies a great concern over the darker, more pessimistic forces of standardization, top-down planning, bureaucracy, and globalization that have acted against diversity and human progress. This was the same kind of concern evident in the work of great thinkers such as Karl Marx, Max Weber, and Joseph Schumpeter, who saw capitalism, bureaucracy, and large corporations as draining the humanity out of modern society. She went on to worry about the eventual decline of the United States, noting that “the collapse will come about as a banal thing.” One can only imagine how unsurprised Jacobs would be by the evolution of America’s economy and society in the decade since her death—particularly the hyper-gentrification of great cities, the growing social and economic divides, the continuing erosion of scientific norms, burgeoning celebrity culture, and, most recently, the rise of Donald Trump—in many ways the symbol of it all. In the course of ''Dark Age'' Ms. Jacobs raises a lot of interesting questions about the nature of dark ages: why certain cultures fall prey to assaults from outside or to rot from within; how a fortress mentality can lead to isolation and technological retreat; how memories of traditions, values and language can fade. She also discusses a lot of troubling recent developments, including corporate corruption, weakening academic standards, the prevalence of imagemaking and spin in politics and business, and the lack of affordable housing in cities like New York. But these discussions are cursory in the extreme, and they are never connected to one another, much less to some larger theory about a coming Dark Age. A lifetime of unwasted experience in a number of fields has gone into this short but pungent book, and to ignore its sober warnings would be foolish indeed. PrémiosDistinctionsNotable Lists
Publisher's description: Visionary thinker Jane Jacobs uses her authoritative work on urban life and economies to show us how we can protect and strengthen our culture and communities. In Dark Age Ahead, Jane Jacobs identifies five pillars of our culture that we depend on but which are in serious decline: community and family; higher education; the effective practice of science; taxation and government; and self-policing by learned professions. The decay of these pillars, Jacobs contends, is behind such ills as environmental crisis, racism and the growing gulf between rich and poor; their continued degradation could lead us into a new Dark Age, a period of cultural collapse in which all that keeps a society alive and vibrant is forgotten. But this is a hopeful book as well as a warning. Jacobs draws on her vast frame of reference -- from fifteenth-century Chinese shipbuilding to zoning regulations in Brampton, Ontario -- and in highly readable, invigorating prose offers proposals that could arrest the cycles of decay and turn them into beneficent ones. Wise, worldly, full of real-life examples and accessible concepts, this book is an essential read for perilous times. Não foram encontradas descrições de bibliotecas. |
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