With magnifying glass in hand, a budding naturalist can learn a great deal about ants scuttling around the driveway. Were the ants to glance upward, however, they might learn even more about the eager eyes—blown up from the ant’s perspective to enormous proportions—looking down at them.
In The Overlooked Americans: The Resilience of Our Rural Towns and What It Means for Our Country, social scientist Elizabeth Currid-Halkett—a member of our country’s coastal, meritocratic elite (her words, not mine)—raises a magnifying glass over middle America and looks for signs of economic optimism and cultural hope among “ordinary Americans.” Unfortunately, the book too often reveals more about the observer than the observed.
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