Tomorrow our department's brownbag lecture will be given by Stanford wiz kid, UA job candidate, and Mormon missionary look-alike, Dan McFarland, and is entitled "Bowling Young" (presumably not a great-great grandchild of Brigham Young). The awkwardness of that title will not seem so awkward to those familiar with Robert Putnum's much touted book Bowling Alone, remembered for its Chicken Little cries of declining civic participation in the U.S. A cursory search of Sociological Abstracts reveals something interesting. The word "bowling" has appeared in Sociology paper titles as many times in the 6 years since the publication of Bowling Alone (in 2000) as in the 35 years preceding it. The titular gymnastics is amusing: Post-Bowling Alone

• Bowling Alone, but Online Together? Virtual Communities and American Public Life (2005)
• 'Bowling Apart?' Four Questions on Poor-Rich Contact in Dutch Sports Clubs (2005)
• No Bowling at All: Television, the Vita Inactiva, and Social Capital (2004)
• Why Should We Be Bowling Alone? Results from a Belgian Survey on Civic Participation (2003)
• Finding a Bowling Partner: The Role of Stakeholders in Activating Civil Society in Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom (2002)
• Bowling with our Imaginary Friends (2002)
• Bowling Together? The Role of Political Conflict in Strengthening Community Action and Civil Society in Northern Ireland (2002)
• Bowling Alone, Policing Together (2001)

Pre-Bowling Alone

• Cultivating Friendship through Bowling in Shenzhen (2000)
• Bowling in the Bronx: The Uncivil Interstices between Civil and Political Society (1999)
• Bowling with Tocqueville: Civic Engagement and Social Capital (1999)
• Developing Civil Society: Can the Workplace Replace Bowling? (1998)
• Burgers, Bowling, and the Myth of Americanizing China (1998)
• "Thunder Is When the Angels Are Upstairs Bowling": Narratives and Explanations at the Dinner Table (1994)
• The Interdependence of Structural Levels and Performance in Bowling Teams (1970)
• A Reply to Kooy's Reply: The Rules of the Bowling Game (1965)

Who knew we were so tied to our bowling?

Labels: graduate school

This entry was posted by Jeff, on Thursday, August 24, 2006. You can leave your response.