Sunday, June 15, 2008
American Nerd
I must take this moment to recommend to you this book: American Nerd: The Story of My People. Part sociology study, part memoir, I just finished it in about a day and a half. Essentially, this guy--Ben Nugent--has taken his own experience as an adolescent video-game playing nerd, and used it as a jumping off point for a sociological, psychological and epistemological exploration of the nerd archetype and nerd culture. I won't define here what he means by "nerd" because he does such an outstanding job of it himself.
So here's my dilemma: I like this book so much that I would ordinarily jump right on amazon and order 5 or 6 copies and start giving them to people BUT I think there might potentially be something offensive about giving someone a book about nerds. Mainly, it implies they are one, and they wouldn't be mistaken about that intention. I do think the book is only satisfying if you are (or think you might be, or might have been) a nerd. This is not necessarily a liability in gift-giving. Nugent writes pretty thoroughly about nerd-chic, hipsterism, and the particulars of how nerdiness became trendy. But it gives me enough pause not to run right to my amazon shopping cart. So for now you're going to have to be content with this recommendation, and fork over the $14 yourself.
So here's my dilemma: I like this book so much that I would ordinarily jump right on amazon and order 5 or 6 copies and start giving them to people BUT I think there might potentially be something offensive about giving someone a book about nerds. Mainly, it implies they are one, and they wouldn't be mistaken about that intention. I do think the book is only satisfying if you are (or think you might be, or might have been) a nerd. This is not necessarily a liability in gift-giving. Nugent writes pretty thoroughly about nerd-chic, hipsterism, and the particulars of how nerdiness became trendy. But it gives me enough pause not to run right to my amazon shopping cart. So for now you're going to have to be content with this recommendation, and fork over the $14 yourself.
