Hutterites: Lives and Images of a Communal People

By Samuel Hofer

Book Overview

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0969305699
• ISBN13: 9780969305699
• Release Date: January 1998
• Publisher: Ex Machina Pub Co
• Length: 184 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 11.0" x 0.8" x 8.8"

Customer Reviews

The culture and history of Hutterites told by an insider

Samuel Hofer is well known in the Northwestern United States and Western Canada for his fiction and nonfiction books about Hutterites, an Anabaptist group that practices communal living. As a former Hutterite himself, Hofer has some unique perspectives into understanding the culture. This book is his successful attempt to present a broad overview of Hutterite culture so that others may understand.Although the book contains many chapters, its information can be divided into two parts. The first part discusses the Hutterite culture, with a large section devoted to describing Hutterite life from birth to death. This chapter gives the readers a good idea of what Hutterite life is like and how Hutterite colonies function. The second part of the book discusses Hutterite history, spanning from the Middle Ages to recent events. This chapter puts the Hutterites in a historical context, providing amazing insights into how key historical events and situations shaped the Hutterite culture. It also provides information on the challenges facing Hutterites today, and why many people, including the author, have left the Hutterite colonies.The book's tone is informative but informal. Hofer also intersperses his own experiences into the text to bolster his discussions on particular topics. While Hofer did become disillusioned with the Hutterite lifestyle and left the colonies, he appears to harbor few negative feelings towards the Hutterites. To the contrary, he seems to be biased in favor of the Hutterite way of life throughout most of the book.Hofer has done an excellent job in describing the Hutterite lifestyle and history, providing me with more insights into the Hutterite culture than I anticipated. I strongly recommend this book for anyone who lives near Hutterites or who wants to learn more about them.

In defense of Samuel Hofer

I have read all of Hofer's books on colony life, both fiction and non-fiction and have found them all immensely helpful. His writing style is honest, if a bit naive. His books run the gamut from researched and documented to biographical, but all ring truthful. I recommend them as references to flesh out the scientific research. From a sociological point of view, nothing compares to the landmark book "Hutterite Society" by Hochstetler and Huntington.

mb00476@mb.sympatico.ca from Manitoba, what Biases?

Your review of Hofer's book: Hutterites: Lives and Images of a Communal People is a biases within of itself because you are a hutterite. It is my understanding that a lot of Brethren Members (hutterites) are against Hofer's work because it reveals the nature of your "authentic" culture, of which you do not want the "outside world" to know about. Should you have taken note of the bibliographic references Hofer used as his research resources, scholarly and academic, perhaps you then would consider not making any irrational statement about biases. The research Hofer has cited in his text is based on objective anthropological, and sociological data, and therefore should be deemed free of biases (of course to an extreme extent). I personally praise his work, and commend him for revealing, as best he can, the truths of his culture: negative, positive, or other. Being an academic (Doctor of Psychology: Cross Cultural Psychology), and an ex-member of the hutterite Brethren I can assure you that his revelations are factual. After all I lived on a hutterite colony for 18 years, and am still in close contact with the sub-culture. Further more, it would be helpful to note which aspects of Hofer's writings you deem as being filled with biases?