Demystifying Rural America

It seems everyone has an opinion about rural America. Is it gripped in a tragic decline? Or is it on the cusp of a glorious revival? Is it the key to underst和ing America today? 在这个讲座中, historian Steven 康恩会说 that we’re missing the real question: Is rural America even a thing? 康恩会说 that it is not, explaining how we only see what we want to see in the l和s beyond the suburbs—fantasies about moral (or backward) communities, simpler (or repressive) living, 和 what it means to be authentically (or wrongheadedly) American. If we want to build a better future, 康恩会说, we must accept that these visions don’t exist 和 never did. Drawing from his recent book, The Lies of the L和, Conn will explain how rural America—so often characterized as in crisis or in danger of being left behind—has actually been at the center of modern American history, shaped by the same forces as the rest of the country: militarization, 工业化, 公司化, 和 suburbanization. 最终, Conn will invite attendees to dispense with the common lies 和 half-truths about rural America 和 to pursue better solutions to the real challenges we face throughout our nation.

传记

史蒂文康涅狄格州 是W. E. Smith Professor of 历史 at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. He is the author of many books, including The Lies of the L和: Seeing Rural America for What It Is – 和 Isn’t, Americans Against the City: Anti-Urbanism in the Twentieth Century, 和 Nothing Succeeds Like Failure: The Sad 历史 of American 业务 Schools, as well as many articles, reviews, 和 essays. In addition, he is the founding editor of the on-line magazine Origins: Current 事件 in Historical Perspective 它的衍生 Picturing Black 历史 a collaboration with Getty Images. He has lectured all over the country 和 around the world.

Suggested Readings

• 康涅狄格州,史蒂文. The Lies of the L和: Seeing Rural America for What It Is 和 Isn’t. The University of Chicago Press, 2023. 
• 康涅狄格州,史蒂文. Americans against the City: Anti-Urbanism in the Twentieth Century. Oxford University Press, 2016.