Roman Ruminations: "The Psychology of the Human as Enculturated Animal"

by Norman Weeks

Overview

ROMAN RUMINATIONS is a trilogy, the volumes of which are LONELINESS, INSTINCT, and LOVE. (Each volume also available separately.) This complete text includes the extras of "A Pause to Reconnoiter" and two "Afterwords".

ROMAN RUMINATIONS presents "the psychology of the human as enculturated animal". If the human is a cultural creature, what better setting for consideration could there be than Rome, the Cosmopolis, one place on earth that contains the all of culture?

In Rome, you learn by venturing out on itineraries. ROMAN RUMINATIONS, then, is a walking tour through human psychology in culture. LONELINESS is treated within the contexts of literature and music, INSTINCT the contexts of mythology and classical sculpture, and LOVE the contexts of religion, philosophy, education, and art. The human mind is revealed by the activities and products of human culture.

The trilogy is not a quick-and-easy l-2-3. Roman itineraries seem random and sometimes wayward--are we getting anywhere?--, but just around the next corner there might be the very insight we are seeking. We know that we won't solve the human or fully understand. Even so, there will be some revelations along our Roman way. Insight is expressed in the "Aha!" of an aphorism.

The characteristic Roman craft was mosaic, lots of little pieces put together to make a picture. ROMAN RUMINATIONS is a mosaic, five hundred little pieces, from which, for those who stand far enough back, a picture may emerge. ROMAN RUMINATIONS is a mosaic of the mind.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940148739616
Publisher:	Norman Weeks
Publication date:	10/22/2013
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	428 KB

About the Author

Born and raised in Chicago, Norman Weeks studied in Rome, earned his degree in history, then settled in to a Roman residence. With Rome as a base, he traveled in fifteen European countries, including those of the old Soviet bloc. His interest in ancient cultures led him on archaeological itineraries throughout the Mediterranean.

Back in the Americas, he served two years as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Brazil, then ventured into Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean. He has guided wilderness excursions into the Minnesota-Ontario Boundary Waters.

In Asia, he immersed himself in the Buddhist cultures of Thailand, India, and Nepal.

Norman Weeks is an experiential writer. He writes about living in Nature and within a culture.

Of the former, NATURE NORM'S NORTH WOODS relates his experiences in the woods-and-waters of the northland, while TROPICAL ECSTASY explores the Amazon and the Northeast of Brazil.

Of culture, he enters into one of the oldest civilizations in TWO WEEKS IN ETERNAL EGYPT. Culture-versus-Nature is a principal theme of WALDEN CONTEMPORANEOUS.

These three volumes of ROMAN RUMINATIONS--(LONELINESS, INSTINCT, and LOVE) delve into "the psychology of the human as an enculturated animal".

Throughout his various writings, Norman Weeks expresses a cosmopolitan appreciation of our world.