Thursday, February 26, 2009

Ken Myer's List of Ten Books to Read to Understand the Culture

Ken Myers, one of our 10 Modern Wise Men, has a list of the ten books you should read to understand the culture.

3 comments:

Lee said...

Thomas Sowell ought to be on that list, or any list, of great writers. You will learn more about how the world works in one of his books than from the opera omnia of public policy books by the thinkers our beloved media extols. Try "Knowledge and Decisions", for starters.

Martin Cothran said...

Lee,

It seems to me that Sowell emphasizes the political as opposed to the cultural. I love is Conflict of Visions and his Vision of the Anointed.

Lee said...

Well, I guess that betrays a lot of my perspective, doesn't it? Politics and economics are subsets of culture, but, aside from Western music, they're about the only parts of the culture that I see.

However, I should point out that Sowell has written many books on other subjects. His book on the American education system touches politics, but is not strictly politics. Several of his books deal with cultural phenomena such as emigration and slavery. A Conflict of Visions is more philosophical than political, I think; I haven't read Vision of the Anointed, but I gather from reviews that he develops a lot of the themes in the earlier book.

I think Knowledge and Decisions may be his most important book.