Does the stork make home deliveries? For many Amish families, the answer is yes. Birth at home, or in Amish-oriented birthing centers, is preferred for a few reasons. They include cost, comfort, and closeness to family. Midwives, some licensed, and others not, often handle deliveries in lieu of a doctor. Midwives may be non-Amish, or [...]
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I just read an article by Donald Kraybill which examines Amish and obedience (http://goo.gl/Sb7e7). In the piece, Kraybill explains why Amish use physical punishment to discipline children, citing an Amish mother named Hannah: Hannah explained that, when children are about two years old, their wills need to be broken. If it’s not done at that stage, [...]
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Well, it’s Thursday morning, and chances are you may already be thinking about the weekend. There was a time, when most Amish were on the farm, when what you did on Saturday didn’t differ in a terribly meaningful way than what you did on Monday. Cows still needed to be milked, fences could still use [...]
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I’m happy to share the Amish Way winners with you today. It was a lot of fun to run this contest and I much enjoyed the interview with authors Donald Kraybill, Steven Nolt, and David Weaver-Zercher (if you missed it: Part 1 and Part 2). I particularly appreciated the point they make about shunning–that it [...]
Continue reading The Amish Way: 10 contest winners and book excerpt
How large is the typical Amish family? The answer can vary by community. Seven is commonly given as an average number of children for Amish. In some settlements, however, it may be closer to six, and in others, can even reach 8 or 9. In The Riddle of Amish Culture, Donald Kraybill notes that roughly [...]
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