The Amish

by Donald B. Kraybill

  Higher Amish groups permit their members to ride in (but not own or operate) motor vehicles for business purposes or long distance travel. This practice illustrates one way such groups have negotiated with modernity. The most traditional Amish groups permit their members to ride in privately owned vehicles only when travel by public transportation (bus or train) or horse and buggy is not feasible. Daniel Rodriguez

  This way of seeing their struggle with modernity distinguishes negotiable issues from nonnegotiable ones and identifies the fault lines of resistance. Our threefold model of resistance, acceptance, and negotiation also underscores the dynamic interaction between Amish society and the larger world, the growing diversity within the Amish world as various subgroups forge different bargains with modern life, and the fact that the outcomes of the deliberations are always uncertain.

  The Meltdown of Solid Modernity

  Our three-part model is complicated because the process of modernization seems unceasing and modernity itself is a slippery concept. The new products and lifestyles of yesterday are the antiquated ones of today. As sociologist Zygmunt Bauman notes in Liquid Modernity, “Modernity means many things, and its arrival and progress can be traced using many and different markers.”12 Moreover, modernity evolves and transforms itself into ever-changing forms. Indeed, two key aspects of present-day modernity are liquidity and speed.

  Bauman argues that modernity has morphed from solid to liquid forms. The solid forms of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century modernity, rooted in social norms and structures, limited human freedom and expression. Stable traditions affix people to a particular place or nation-state, often by invoking God’s will to bless social hierarchies, including human-made rules about race, gender, caste, and class. Solid modernity provides social stability through slow-to-change bureaucratic institutions and rigid factories such as those created by Henry Ford, where employees each played a specialized role and functioned as components of an assembly line whose only purpose was efficient production.

  During the last quarter of the twentieth century, however, the solid forms of modernity began melting into more liquid ones. Transitions from still photos to video, from landline to mobile phones, from a factory-based economy to Internet commerce, from manufacturing to service industries, and from physical books to e-books all signal the meltdown of solid modernity. The World Wide Web, with its vast virtual universe, illustrates the weightless, mobile, ephemeral, ever-changing liquidity of twenty-first-century modernity.

  French philosopher Gilles Lipovetsky, in Hypermodern Times, makes a convincing case that speed, intensity, and excess typify our supermodern lives. Our hyper-hyper-everything culture that wants more and more, faster and faster, can lead to superficiality, spectacle, and insecurity. Fast food, faster microprocessors, instant downloads, immediate tweets, express mail, extreme sports, hypertext, hyperindividualism, and rushed everything—all produce data overload, excessive choice, and anxiety because we are always short on time and can never keep up.13

  The speed and fluidity of contemporary modernity complicate Amish negotiations. For example, the solid modernity typified by the landline telephones the Amish resisted in 1910 is unlike the forces of liquid modernity that produced smartphones. Much of the Amish saga is rooted in their resistance to the solid forms of modernity in the first half of the twentieth century: telephones, cars, tractors, and consolidated public schools. How will they fare in a hypermodern world, in which change is instantaneous and temptation lurks not only in the city or in the movie theater but also on handheld devices in backcountry fields? Will the Amish need to shift their coping strategies in order to survive in this swirling sea of fluid modernity?

  The ongoing dialogue with modernity has created many struggles within Amish society, and on a few occasions unresolved differences spawned new Amish groups. The factions most determined to resist modernity have found security in their traditional ways, whereas those open to change have been more willing to bargain with the wider world.

  Searching for the “Real” Amish

  A young Amish child learns that she is different from the outside world. She also discovers that her church district, whose members drive black carriages, has different rules than the church district two miles up the road, whose members drive yellow-topped buggies.

  Asked how her church differs from another Amish group in the same area, an Amish storekeeper responds, “Oh, there’s hardly any difference between us.” Down the road, however, a member of that other group answers the same question this way: “I don’t know where to begin. I don’t even know how those other [Amish] people can call themselves Amish.”

  A non-Amish bookstore owner in Easton, Maryland, speaks with annoyance about a new Amish farmers’ market that recently opened on the edge of town: “They say they’re Amish, but they’re not because they use cell phones and ride in vans and have electric lights in their market.”

  So will the “real” Amish please stand up? In truth, all of these people are genuine Amish. Real Amish are those in Williams County, Ohio, who live in austere houses and flee from all appearances of ostentation; they are also those who reside in sizable, attractive brick homes in Rush County, Indiana. Real Amish women are those bent over quilting frames, and they are those pushing Walmart shopping carts. Authentic Amish men are those wearing two suspenders or one suspender or none, and they are farmers, welding-shop owners, and factory employees building recreational vehicles.

  In the early twenty-first century, there are some forty different Amish affiliations—clusters of church districts linked by social and spiritual bonds. The congregations in an affiliation usually share the same history or distinctive practices—or some combination of both. Some affiliations have names, such as Swartzentruber Amish, New Order Amish, or Byler Amish, but others are known only by the name of the town or area where their members live. The largest groups have more than a hundred districts, while others have only a few. Tribes such as the Lancaster Amish and the Swiss Amish have congregations in several states, as we describe in chapter 8. In addition, some districts, although not linked to an affiliation, still maintain bonds of fellowship with a few other districts.

  Affiliations fall along a continuum of low-to-high traditionalism, as shown in figure 1.2. Amish people refer to the most traditional clusters as “low,” meaning that they are near the bottom rung of the ladder of assimilation into modern society and that they resist changes that would pull them up the ladder. In contrast, the more progressive affiliations are dubbed “high” because they are inching up the social ladder and getting ever closer to the outside world. The lowest groups still use outhouses, milk their cows by hand, and hang kerosene lanterns on their buggies at night. The higher ones have LED lights installed on their carriages, use automatic milkers, carry cell phones, and pay third parties to advertise their business wares on the Internet.

  FIGURE 1.2. Amish Affiliations by Moral Authority and Separation from the World

  Considering the magnitude of difference in Amish life, it is hazardous to speak of “the Amish” as if they were one unified group. Although all Amish people share many religious and cultural values, they express them in diverse ways. Nonetheless, they have some common practices, as shown in table 1.1.

  In many settlements, shop owners, mechanics, carpenters, and factory workers are fast replacing the Amish farmer, once the quintessential Amish worker. Differences also mark the world of women’s work. Homemaking remains the occupation of many Amish women, but increasing numbers own and manage small businesses.14 In some groups, construction crews travel to suburban areas for work, but certain traditional affiliations forbid working in suburban locales. Adults in some of the higher affiliations occasionally join tour groups that travel by bus to scenic sites, something that members of lower churches would never do.

  Table 1.1. Ten Practices Amish Groups Have in Common

  Rural residence

  German-based dialect

  Eighth-grade education


  Church services in homes

  Small local congregations

  Lay ministers

  Church-regulated dress

  Selective use of technology

  Horse-and-buggy transportation

  Nonparticipation in the military

  Other differences are harder to see but no less significant. A majority of Amish parents view private schooling as a key ally in passing on their religious values to the next generation, and they defend their schools as on par with public education. But parents in some lower affiliations marginalize formal schooling, contending that the child’s real education takes place outside the schoolroom.15 And in a few areas, some Amish children attend public schools, although only through the eighth grade.16

  Changes in the larger society also elicit different responses from Amish people. Although some families in Ontario participate in provincial health insurance plans, most do not. Across the continent, Amish appraisals of biomedical and psychological therapies vary widely. Members of some more traditional groups turn to age-old remedies such as wearing copper rings to ward off arthritis and consulting homeopathic healers for health problems. At the same time, members of many liberal tribes see family physicians and undergo state-of-the-art medical procedures.

  Despite the differences, all Amish people live in rural areas and use horse-drawn carriages for local travel.17 They speak a German-based dialect but also learn to speak and write in English. Their worship services are led by lay clergy without theological training. All Amish congregations subscribe to the beliefs codified in the 1632 Dordrecht Confession of Faith and sing a cappella hymns written in the sixteenth century. All wear distinctive clothing, although the patterns and styles vary by affiliation.

  Apart from songbooks and benches, Amish church districts own no property, have no church buildings, and lack any traces of the bureaucracy that marks modern institutional life and mainstream religion.18 There are no national or regional Amish offices, synods, conferences, or even written constitutions that confer ecclesiastical authority or streamline uniformity. The Amish have no theological seminaries, social service agencies, official periodicals, or youth camps. As we explain in chapter 10, the diverse Amish groups are linked together by informal bonds of family, ethnicity, and fellowship.

  Our operational definition of Amish includes any group that (1) affirms the basic tenets of Amish belief outlined in the 1632 Dordrecht Confession of Faith, including adult baptism, separation from the world, and nonviolence; (2) uses horse-drawn transportation; (3) speaks a German-derived dialect; and (4) considers itself Amish. Most Amish view other “Plain people,” such as traditional, plain-dressing Mennonites and Brethren, to be theological kin because their churches share some historical ties, beliefs (such as adult baptism and nonviolence), and a conviction that the church should stand apart from popular culture. For an overview of the non-Amish plain-dressing groups, see Appendix A.

  Amish Stories, American Stories

  Cultural identity is not a fixed or inherited set of characteristics. The symbols, patterns of behavior, mental habits, and folkways that shape identity are constructed through conversations both with in-group members and with outsiders. Those conversations mark boundaries, but they are porous and dynamic ones. In short, cultural identity is socially constructed through interaction, and its meanings are fluid and ever changing.19

  As humans we construct narratives—stories that make sense of our experiences, interpret our lives, and offer us an identity. “We tell and retell narratives that themselves come fundamentally to constitute and direct our lives,” says sociologist Christian Smith. In telling these stories, we “understand what reality is, who we are, and how we ought to live by locating ourselves within the larger narratives … that we hear and tell.” Our cultural narratives create identity by reminding us who we are, where we came from, what we are doing, and why.20

  Some narratives are well-rehearsed and crisply conveyed through television advertisements or campaign speeches—or, among the Amish, through ancient hymns or Sunday morning sermons. More often, though, these narratives, Amish and non-Amish alike, are folded into less articulate and even nonverbal messages, symbols, church regulations, and ordinary practices of daily living. Formal or informal, articulate or not, narratives communicate meanings—through the settings, the parties involved, and the interactions—that shape and reshape cultural identity.

  Amish identity emerges as children hear adults offering accounts of why things are the way they are. They learn where Amish people fit in the world, why they do what they do, and how they are different from English people, even from other Amish people. Telling these stories in the flow of daily living animates their lives and provides a distinctive Amish lens for seeing and interpreting the world. Amish identity is not merely the sum of buggies, bonnets, and beards. Rather, identity arises from a process of creating and making meaning, somewhat akin to storytelling.

  Amish children grow up immersed in symbols that define their lives in sharp contrast to the outside world. They do not wear the popular clothing styles displayed in store windows. As they travel to town, sleek cars speed past their slow-paced horse-drawn buggy. Even when their destination is the local Burger King, and they place their order in English, they converse with one other in a dialect unknown to other patrons.

  All of these patterns of separation and distinction raise an interesting question: Are the Amish Americans? They certainly think so. When we asked an Amish leader that question, he retorted with a tone of irritation, “Of course we are; we live here!” Indeed, the ancestors of most Amish people arrived in America over two centuries ago. Even the most conservative Amish claim the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment in their struggle against laws that they feel infringe on their religious convictions.

  Yet the question probes something deeper than the simple affirmative answer. It digs into other layers of inquiry such as these: Have the Amish absorbed core American values? Do they dream the American dream? Do they desire the same things as “the rest of us”? In some ways they seem like outsiders or strangers, even the exotic “other” as people in faraway cultures are sometimes labeled. Have they truly become Americans, or do they just live here?

  The Amish story bears some similarities to the narratives that shape most other Americans, but it explains reality in ways that are at odds with mainstream American sensibilities. Consider these two quite different cultural narratives: one that reflects how Amish people might tell their story, and one that might be told by many middle-class Americans.21

  An Amish Story

  * * *

  A long time ago in Europe, our forebears were persecuted because they refused to baptize babies or worship idols in the Catholic Church. Back then the government and the church were mixed up together, and the government tried to tell the church what to do. A lot of our ancestors were burned at the stake or had their heads cut off because they wanted to follow Jesus and live as the Bible says. They thought the Bible was a higher authority than any human government. Like Jesus, our martyrs didn’t fight back when they were persecuted. Eventually they came to America to find religious freedom and good farmland.

  Our ancestors faced the same basic problems we still do today—pride, disobedience, greed—and if we listen to what they said, we can save ourselves a lot of heartache. They established many good traditions that have helped to preserve our church. We try to stay away from worldly things and not get mixed up with government. But we do pray for elected officials and pay taxes because Jesus said we should.

  Over the years our church has made many rules that help guide how we should live. I don’t always understand the reasons behind some of the rules, but I know that they hold a lot of wisdom because a person can’t always make good decisions on his own. It’s better to rely on each other than just on yourself.

  I’m amazed by how much the world has changed. The world seems to go so fast these days, and people almost worship sex and money. From what I read in the
newspapers, a lot of Americans are lonely, and families are falling apart. We think that having big families and a close-knit church, living in the country, and not using too much technology are the best ways to be content on this earthly journey.

  The church helps protect us from the dangers of the world, but we have our problems too. The most important things in life are to obey God, the church, and our parents and to help each other whenever we can so that we can be a light to the world. We are just strangers and pilgrims here because we’re just passing through on our way to a heavenly home.

  An American Story

  * * *

  Our way of life has always been about freedom. In 1776 Americans decided they didn’t want a king telling them what to do or taxing them without their consent, so they started a revolution. The founders of our country believed in liberty, and even though some owned slaves, they created a society that’s still a beacon of liberty for the whole world. Unlike other places in the world, people here got rid of superstitions and realized that individuals had a right to think for themselves and should not be controlled by folklore or old traditions that didn’t mean anything to them.