This anthology poses challenges central to Elizabeth Minnich's book The Evil of Banality: On The Life and Death Importance of Thinking to outstanding thought leaders from a wide range of fields. In a time when even small acts can have consequences that spread wider and much faster than ever, when public discourse is more banal and superficial even as it is inflated by bluster and fractured by group-think, knee-jerk partisanship, and hyper-specialization, it is a book whose outstanding authors reflect with urgency on how we can and why we must think what we are doing as professionals, citizens, public actors, and, crucially also, as educators. The book brings together a group of distinguished thought leaders in widely varied fields: philosophy, evaluation, community organizing, sociology, systems thinking, business management, sociology, leadership, humanities, public policy, ethics, and religion. Each of these authors has struggled with how to practice as well as how to teach people not only to be "a success" as measured by title, office, and pay, but how and why it is crucial that each and all of us learn to think well about what we are doing, its effects, how and why we are doing it. They discuss issues such as lying; the ethics of 'fixing' genes that will then be passed on; knowing when, even whether, to intervene in genocide; unintended effects of economic development efforts; the effects of rewards only for short-term studies; making public policy with the public. Philosophically framed and interdisciplinary in approach, the book is written to be accessible to a general educated audience. It is designed to be thought-provoking, illuminating, and useful.

About the Author
Elizabeth K. Minnich Distinguished Fellow with the Association of American Colleges & Universities, she is the author of The Evil of Banality: On The Life and Death Importance of Thinking; Transforming Knowledge, 2nd Edition (recipient of the Frederic Ness Award). She has taught and served in the administration at Barnard College/Columbia University, and Sarah Lawrence College. Her visiting Chairs have included the Hartley Burr Alexander Chair in Public Philosophy at Scripps College, the Thomas P. Johnson Visiting Distinguished Professor at Rollins College, and the Whichard Visiting Distinguished Professor in Humanities and Women's Studies at East Carolina University. During her doctoral studies, she served as Hannah Arendt's teaching assistant; her dissertation was on John Dewey. Michael Quinn Patton Former President of the American Evaluation Association, and recipient of both the Alva and Gunnar Myrdal Award from the Evaluation Research Society and the Paul F. Lazarsfeld Award from the American Evaluation Association. The Society for Applied Sociology honored him with the 2001 Lester F. Ward Award for Outstanding Contributions to Applied Sociology. Author of 8 evaluation books including 4th editions of Utilization-Focused Evaluation (2008) and Qualitative Research and Evaluation Methods (2015). He is also author of Creative Evaluation; Practical Evaluation; and Culture and Evaluation (1985).

Reviews
This book resolutely confronts the dangers of banality in classrooms, boardrooms, and in public. It provides timely and vital strategies for exposing and resisting seemingly innocuous silence and inaction which allows incipient violence to escalate even to the level of genocide. -- Bill Gay, professor emeritus of philosophy, UNC Charlotte
A new forum for common thinking about thinking. A real masterpiece! For everyone who believes in the value of liberal arts education, this volume ought to become a manual to pore over night and day. -- Jerzy Axer, director, Collegium Artes Liberales, University of Warsaw
Specialists from a dizzying array of disciplines provocatively engage with Minnich's previous book, The Evil of Banality, and potently heed the call to attend to the practice of thinking across and within all fields. -- Brian R. Clack, professor of philosophy & A. Vassiliadis Director of the Humanities Center, University of San Diego
If we want to think about thinking in all its richness, unfettered and unbanistered (and we must!), this is an excellent help, with friends of thinking working in a most capacious mode. -- Stephen Bloch-Schulman, associate professor and chair of philosophy, Elon University



Book Information
ISBN 9781538131534
Author Elizabeth K. Minnich
Format Paperback
Page Count 370
Imprint Rowman & Littlefield
Publisher Rowman & Littlefield
Weight(grams) 508g
Dimensions(mm) 222mm * 152mm * 20mm