PERSON, PLACE, AND NARRATIVE IN ART AMISH FARMERS APPROPRIATION OF NATURE WRITING

Amish-authored nature essays were introduced to the Amish by Samuel Miller, an Amish fanner with an interest in nature study developed at home and in school. Miller's nature essays published in the Amish periodical, Family Life, were the first examples of the nature essay genre that were widely circulated in Amish communities. The acceptance of this new genre was due to Miller's particular manner of appropriation that connected it to the Amish cultural value of closeness to nature and the soil by making the family farm and surrounding countryside the setting of his writing Other key factors that facilitated the introduction of the genre include Miller's use of personalized knowledge of nature, expressed most clearly in personal narratives, as well as social change within Amish society brought about by the influence of an Amish publishing house. Miller's writing raises issues regarding the genre-mediated construction of identify and the effects of genre in reproducing and altering cultural values.