Description: Gary Fine explores how Americans attempt to give meaning to the natural world that surrounds them. Fine suggests that the meanings we assign to the natural environment are culturally grounded and he supports this claim by examining the fascinating world of mushrooming.
Brief description: Gary Alan Fine is Professor of Sociology at Northwestern University.
Review Quotes: As with the best of good sociology, we are quickly persuaded [in Morel Tales] that by studying seemingly esoteric behavior, mushroom hunting, we can learn about basic social processes. Examining the odd can lead to confrontation with what is central to human experience...Fine argues and illustrates with rich data that there is no nature without culture and no culture without particular social groups acting within concrete situations...A well-crafted sociological study, Morel Tales weaves together a well-developed grounded theory with interesting ethnographic description. .. Next time someone asks me 'What's so special about the way sociologists approach the world? What do sociologists have to offer?' I will recommend Morel Tales.--Robert Bogdan "Contemporary Sociology"