Thoughts on production, alienation, and ideology
These are posts about books from the blog Base and Superstructure. Occasionally I’ll read a book worth talking about, and write some thoughts on it. These cover a wide range of topics from the blog.
What are people looking for when they’re thinking about ‘summer reads’? How about you? It seems like most people take it to mean adventure stories or books to take with them on vacation.
I guess there’s some of that in my July list. But I can’t say I have anything too specific in mind when I’m talking about the summer. I suspect my summer reading isn’t that much different from other parts of the year.
Without further ado…
Recent Iowa City mayor Jim Throgmorton wrote a book about his time on the city council in Iowa City. He calls it Co-Crafting the Just City. I’ll get to why he called it that in just a bit. But for now, I’ll say it’s a rare kind of book. People don’t often write about the politics of a small U.S. city. And certainly not in the kind of detail one finds here.
As some readers know, I moved to Iowa City in 2007. And I served on the city’s Housing and Community Development Commission from 2019 to 2022 (the final year as chair). So, I know about many of the political debates Thorgmorton mentions. I followed most of them closely – some very closely.
Overall, Throgmorton does a fine job listing the basic issues at play. He does so, of course, from his own (in some ways limited) perspective. That’s to be expected. I’ll sketch out some of the book’s goals and insights into Iowa City politics.
After a month full of Silicon Valley and sci-fi, I moved on to a much wider variety of topics. On this month’s reading list, I’ve got everything from sci-fi to food politics to regular politics to TV shows.
Some thoughts to follow, and I hope everyone enjoys!
It’s time for another reading list post! This month’s list will focus heavily on Silicon Valley and science fiction. Without further ado…
Alright, we’ve officially hit the spring. Like (hopefully) all of you, I’m ready to move along to that spring reading. Let’s see what we’ve got!
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