A More Perfect Union: Domestic Tranquility
The Wisconsin Humanities Council offers a "pre-packaged" DISCUSSION KIT for libraries, book clubs, campus and school groups, UW-Extension programs, or any not-for-profit or ad-hoc group.
The Milagro Beanfield War by John Nichols
Publisher: Owl Books (February 15, 2000)
ISBN-10: 0805063749
Joe Mondragon never expects that by illegally tapping into his community’s main irrigation ditch he will inspire an uprising. As a motley assortment of locals gradually sees their interests and pride tied to Mondragon’s act of civil disobedience, the Anglo powerbrokers in the capital worry that this rural Latino community might revolt against a major development scheme. The resource “war” that follows is a comedy of errors and tactical maneuvers that sometimes brings people together, sometimes deepens divides. A contemporary classic, the novel’s portrayal of disputes between locals and outsiders will resonate with Wisconsin communities where competing visions of land use are pressing issues.
When do you take the law into your own hands?
Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver
Publisher: Harper Perennial (October 16, 2001)
ISBN-10: 0060959037
Set among the mountains and struggling farms of southern Appalachia, three stories come together one summer—a season of “extravagant procreation”—to create a matrix of characters, each tied to the land in his or her own way. Deanna Wolfe is a wildlife biologist who is tracking a family of coyotes that has just moved into the valley. Her world is disturbed when a hunter arrives with a personal vendetta against the coyotes. Nearby, city-bred Lusa must fit into the tight-knit farming community if she is to claim the land she has grown to love. All the while, two elderly neighbors argue across a fence-line, learning that “everything alive is connected to every other by fine, invisible threads.”
When does our need for community temper our differences?
The Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle
Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (September 1, 1996)
ISBN-10: 014023828X
This timely story revolves around two couples leading parallel (but very different) lives in the hills of southern California. Delaney, a nature writer, and his wife Kyra, a real estate agent, are wealthy, politically correct suburbanites who face—with growing unease— the Mexican workers who seem to be threatening their comfortable lives. As their community organizes to build a gated wall, immigrants Candido and America Rincon are illegally camping in a nearby valley. A car accident brings Candido and Delaney together, leaving Candido too injured to work and Delaney angry, guilty, and ultimately vengeful. This fast-paced story raises issues of security, personal responsibility, and inequality, while offering a critical view of the real and imagined walls that divide us.
How do we balance personal freedom with collective security?
The Devil’s Highway by Luis Alberto Urrea
Publisher: Back Bay Books; Reprint edition (September 19, 2005)
ISBN-10: 0316010804
This work of nonfiction tells the story of twenty-six Mexican men who attempt to enter the U.S. through an area in the Arizona desert known as the Devil's Highway. Vivid descriptions bring to life the men who left Veracruz to follow the promises of smugglers, known as “coyotes,” and seek work in the north. Led astray and lost in the desert, only twelve survived. Those who didn’t are known as the "Yuma 14," named for the Border Patrol sector where they died. Urrea’s mix of first-person testimony, geographic details, cultural history, economic analysis, and insightful commentary raises questions about U.S. border policies and the nature of the many walls separating us from Mexico.
What do national boundaries keep out? What do they keep in?