[extropy-chat] School libraries and skiffy

[Keith Henson]

At 02:38 PM 11/7/2006 -0600, Damien wrote:
>At 03:24 PM 11/7/2006 -0500, Keith Henson wrote:
>
> >PS.  I went through about a dozen high school libraries in the San Jose
> >area around 1995 looking at the books of my childhood (Heinlein, Clarke,
> >Asimov and others) to see if the failure of those books to be read after
> >some point in the early 70s was widespread, similar to what I had  noticed
> >in my daughter's middle school.  It was.  I have no theory as to why.
>
>The stories, settings and "Golden Age" voice were too antique? No
>cool kid, nor even a nerd, wanted to read skool library books? Those
>books were by then abundantly available in 2nd hand pb form, and had
>already been read or acquired or handed down? Bah--them kids today?

I have no idea.  It sure would be an interesting project to research and 
find out.

While science fiction fandom is not the same as science fiction readers, 
fandom has been aging only a bit less than a year/year.

Keith

PS  One thing I didn't mention is the shear number of kids who were armed 
in my high school.  In those days nobody thought a thing about knives and 
while not that many carried guns, I was among those who did.  Especially 
during deer season, virtually all the guys who had pickup trucks had a gun 
rack with a rifle in it.

Of course to *use* a gun or even a knife without extreme and justified 
provocation was unthinkable.