Recommended Reading-“The Seventeen Traditions”
“Published on Tuesday, November 27, 2007 by CommonDreams.org
The Lost Art of Family Traditions
by Ralph Nader
They are free, valuable, personal and too often not mentioned or used. I speak of the insights, wisdom and experiences of families over several generations.
Now that Thanksgiving weekend is over, how many families recounted some of their traditions for their children and grandchildren to absorb and enjoy? It is highly probable that electronic toys, music and videos received more than a little attention over those four days.
That is a problem. Many youngsters are spending about 50 hours a week watching screens-television, video and computer-for the most part as spectators or engaged in trivial pursuits such as endless text messaging or fiddling with their Facebook profile.
Yet in the overall picture of family upbringing, it is what families do together, participate with one another and their friends or relatives in their neighborhood that significantly shape character and personality.
Earlier this year, I wrote a book called “The Seventeen Traditions” about how my mother and father raised four children in a small factory town in Connecticut during the Thirties, Forties and Fifties.
The seventeen traditions marked the ways we were raised-learning to listen, how to think independently, how to learn from history and from our siblings, how to work, care for our community, respect our parents and relish simple enjoyments needing our engagement, for example.
The reaction to this book from around the country was uniformly positive, making this the only book I have written that everyone loves.”
This entry was posted on Thursday, November 29th, 2007 at 9:20 am and is filed under Friends and Colleagues, Industry News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
