Learning to Glow: A Nuclear Reader - Hardcover

Bradley, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0816519552 ISBN 13: 9780816519552

Publisher: University of Arizona Press, 2000

Synopsis

Atomic energy is not only invisible, it has been cloaked in secrecy by government, industry, and the military. Yet for many Americans the effects of radiation have been less than secret. Just ask the radium workers in Ottawa, Illinois, the "downwinders" of Utah, or unsuspecting veterans of the Gulf War. When told from the perspective of ordinary people, nuclear history takes on a much different tone from that of the tranquil voices of authority who always told us we had nothing to fear. In Learning to Glow, twenty-four essays testify to many of the unsuspected human and environmental costs of atomic science. They show that Americans have paid a terrible price for supposedly "winning" the Cold War--for although the nuclear nightmare may be over, we are still living with nuclear threats every day. Writers such as Scott Russell Sanders, Terry Tempest Williams, and Barbara Kingsolver reveal the psychic and emotional fallout of the Cold War and of subsequent developments in nuclear science. The essays include personal testimonies of what it was like to grow up with family members in nuclear-related jobs; hard-hitting journalism on the health and environmental costs of our nuclear policies and practices; and poignant stories of coming to terms with nuclear power, including contributions by writers who revisit Hiroshima in an attempt to heal the wounds left by the Bomb. These essays offer an alternative to the official version of nuclear history as told to us by school textbooks, government authorities, and nuclear industry officials. They are stories of and by ordinary people who have suffered the consequences of the decisions made by those in power-stories that have been largely ignored, dismissed, or suppressed. They will challenge readers to re-examine their preconceptions about the way we deal with issues of nuclear arms and radioactive waste because they show that nuclear history does not belong to experts but to us all.

Contributors:
Marilou Awiakta
John Bradley
Jim Carrier
Alison Hawthorne Deming
Mary Dickson
Edward Dougherty
Ray Gonzalez
Karl Grossman
Sonya Huber
Barbara Kingsolver
Valerie Kuletz
Mary Laufer
Kay Mack
Craig McGrath
Bill Mesler
Richard H. Minear
Randy Morris
Mayumi Oda
Catherine Quigg
Richard Rawles
Kenneth Robbins
Scott Russell Sanders
David Seaborg
Terry Tempest Williams
Bill Witherup
Phil Woods

About this title

About the Author

John Bradley is an award-winning poet who also edited the volume Atomic Ghost: Poets Respond to the Nuclear Age. He teaches writing at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb.

Reviews

Now that the cold war is over, the urgent threat of the nuclear arms war is virtually forgotten, though reports of nuclear "accidents" occasionally crop up. This anthology is intended to heighten awareness of the continued threat and to encourage ways of better managing U.S. policy on nuclear arms. This harrowing collection includes stories of workers toiling in munition plants during the Korean War, the testing of atomic bombs in the New Mexican desert, the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and, more recently, reports of Persian Gulf War veterans suffering illnesses from exposure to uranium-coated ammunition. Also, Barbara Kingsolver, Scott Russell Sanders, and others examine the psychological and emotional impact of the threat of nuclear arms. The book is organized into three parts: personal testimonies from those who grew up during the cold war, examination of health and environmental costs of nuclear policies, and suggestions for overcoming fear and anxiety about nuclear disasters and how to "face nuclear decisions." Vanessa Bush

From the beginning of the Cold War in 1950 through the 1990s, the nations of the world prepared to defend themselves through the manufacture and stockpiling of nuclear weapons. This book is a collection of 24 essays about ordinary people who, because of where they lived or worked, experienced the consequences of nuclear weapons manufacture and radiation exposure. Contributing authors include noted writers (Barbara Kingsolver, Terry Tempest Williams), journalists, professors, and activists who vividly recount details of the illnesses, deaths, suspicion, fear, and lies that were commonplace in the affected communities and the appalling secrecy and neglect by government, industry, and the military that intensified the suffering. The effects on participants, observers, and victims of the bomb tests in the Nevada Desert, Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki are particularly revealing. Nuclear weapons manufacture and testing are still going on throughout the world. This anthology will be a wake-up call for those who fail to learn the lessons of history. Recommended.
-Irwin Weintraub, Brooklyn Coll. Lib., NY
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Arizona Press
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0816519552
• ISBN 13: 9780816519552
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 317