>> is it moving towards a society without a government or is it something that -- >> i don't go there. i'm not trying to solve the problem for everybody. i'm not trying to solve the problem for the country. i've concluded to the contrary that it can't be solved. all i'm saying is that you can do something about it. you can save your family if you want to. what else is implied by that decision, i can't tell. i can just tell you that we have the technology. we have the knowledge. we know how we can do it. and so it becomes a personal choice. either you will or you won't. but i can't and won't extrapolate that to say what the country should look like in five years 'cause i can't. >> do you -- do you personally make steps in your life to try to live a sustainable -- >> i do. i have a sanctuary of sorts. it is not self-sufficient but it has the elements and i could put them in place very quickly. i grow some of my own food. i have some animals. i have 20 acres. i heat with wood.

i have enough solar to get me through emergencies. i'm certainly not living in a fully sustainable fashion but i have the systems in place to where i could in a very sort order. >> i thank you very much. we've been speaking with thomas for impact: surviving the crash of the industrial age by sustainable living." >> in their book "carjacked," fernandez that the price of gasoline are not the only problems for america's love of cars. ms. lutz fernandez speaks for 30 minutes in new canaan, connecticut. >> thank you, hello. welcome. and first of all i'd like to thank elm street books and the new canaan library for inviting me to speak tonight and thank you for coming to tonight. my name is anne lutz fernandez.

i wanted to share with you initially just our decision to write the book, where that came from. and it really all happened just a few miles from here at my home in norwalk over thanksgiving weekend about four years ago. my sister and i were there. our family had gathered. and from various points driven, of course, to norwalk and my driveway was filled with cars. and spent a beautiful weekend celebration together. but invariably as had happened in the past prior few years, the conversation turned to the loss of our cousin christie in a car crash. and shortly after we lost christie, i lost a good friend in a highway crash. and these two losses had a profound affect on our lives. and we started chewing on the contradictions that the car

presents particularly that contradiction between the intense pleasure that the car brings to us and the profound losses and tragedies that it also can bring. and on a daily basis the contradictions between the convenience that the car brings and the frustrations that it also brings. so broadly speaking we wanted to explore the impact that this single object, that this power piece of technology has on our lives and we thought we could bring to bear our experiences. my sister katherine lutz is a professor of anthropologist. she brings an ethnographic approach and i'm a teacher and writer and i spent many years as a banker and a marketer of consumer products and we thought if we tackled this together we could bring some insight, some insight that hadn't really been brought to the subject. and we embarked on our research which took us across the country from urban housing developments that were being carve judd out of rural countryside in

tennessee to detroit to visit gm and go to its proving grounds in milford. we traveled to seedy used car lots in the inner cities. we traveled to auto shows and auto museums. and we spoke to a variety of people with expertise around the car and around the ancillary services that are provided. and those who worked to mitigate against some of the negative effects of the car. but mostly we talked to ordinary people. the owners, the buyers, the drivers of the 244 million cars that are in our roadways. and really, of course, our research started earlier. as all of ours do, with the family car. and this is the lutz family. [laughter] >> and it's not the bob lutz family. i've actually been asked a few times really whether we're

related to the detroit legend, the outspoken bob lutz, who's worked at the big three automakers and the answer is no. [laughter] >> if it was yes, i suppose, we already would have been cut out of the will. no. this is the george lutz family. this is a family that like many grew up in the suburbs. and grew up around cars. and we both -- my sister and i had tremendous positive memories surrounding the vehicles that we grew up in. trips to grandma's, day trips to the beach. most of our memories were positive. and as we started talking to americans we came to realize how powerful nostalgia is in re-enforcing intensely positive ideas around the automobile. at the auto museums they understand this and we went to a few. at one we met a gentleman named dave who was there for his saturday morning drive in his beloved ford mustang. and he was wearing a watkins

glenn jacket over his car print shirt and we asked dave -- we said when did you become interested in cars? and he said when i opened my eyes and realized i was born. [laughter] >> and in many ways that's true for all of us. and my sister, the anthropologist, likes to put it that to humans, culture is like water is to fish. because it surrounds us, it's often quite invisible even though we're in it. and the ideology that supports our car culture is something that is largely invisible to us and that we started to explore fairly early in our research. the images that bombard us daily from the media are quite different than those family snapshots. not quite so comforting but much more exciting. much more glamorous. this poster from 2008's ironman starring robert downey, jr.,

provides just the kind of car excitement we've come to expect not just from car advertising again but from much of the entertainment that we indulge in that is car centric. and american car ideology like the messages that come to us in many hollywood films is supported by a series of core american values. individualism, freedom are two of the key but also family -- the very american dream. the automakers have tapped into these core american values in their advertising. and year in and year out, we are exposed to tens of messages. let alone the marketing, the promotion, the publicity. because we're exposed to this year in and year out from the moment we open our eyes and realize we are born, we come to intensely associate these ideas that we already have about what the car can provide us. we associate those as values

even more intensely with the car. freedom is one of the key values that the car taps into. and the iconic image of the lone car traveling wickedly wildly, and freely down this empty roadway, no other cars in sight, is really an exhilarating image of freedom that we imbibed. in daily conversations we tend to talk more modestly about the convenience that the car provides. but over and over when we talk to people about the car, one of the things they said to us was, i just really like the idea that i can get into this vehicle anytime i want, whenever i want and go wherever i want. it makes me free. and we truly do believe that the car makes us free. it can provide liberating adventures in the wilderness as car advertising so often represents it. if you think of the dozens of

model names, the escape, the explorer, the expedition, the quest, the odyssey -- we are being sent out on this grand adventure that is often to the supermarket. [laughter] >> because the breathtaking view that we tend to see is this one of the highway, out your windshield much more likely to see the brake lights of cars stopping and stopping you because of all of the values that the car taps into, it subverts those very same values. we are hardly free when you think that we spend 18.5 hours on average a week in our vehicles. as drivers or passengers. and if you calculate that as part of our waking lives, that's nearly two months of every year. that we are sitting in our cars. that's the average.

as a nation in terms of mileage, 4 trillion miles are traveled by us is year. and that is quite an increase. it's about double what it was 25 years ago. but with the millions of cars on the road we are often alone. and there are few spots on the landscape that are without roads. even the national parks are crisscrossed with roads and play host to traffic jams in the summer. trapped in our carsñ;we are finding ourselves to be less free than we wished to be. and traffic is getting worse. and it's getting worse in the big cities, the small cities, the in between cities. and we're noticing it. and it's starting to make us not like driving quite so much as we once did. in fact, one of the auto executives that we spoke to said that americans really like the idea of driving better than

driving itself. and the real driving that we do when we set aside our idea is actually quite frustrating and the lack of control that we feel is the antithesis of the freedom that we hope the car will provide us. so -- sorry, why are we doing all of this driving? suburban sprawl is a big part of it. obviously as the corporations moved out and took their jobs out to the suburbs and some of us decided to get further away and go for the bigger house and a larger yard, we found ourselves driving more to get to work. and a lot of people that we spoke to felt kind of helpless about this. and said, you know, what choice do i have. i have to get to work. but quite a bit of that is our choice. so if we are choosing where to live and often our choices where to live is the perceived value of our housing in relation to our jobs, we're creating our own lengthened commute. and many of the trips that we're

taking are not commuting trips. so when we look at -- where is all of this traffic coming from? well, it's coming from increased trips to school, to run errands, to shop. and, in fact, the busiest hour on our nation's roadways is no longer what you would expect 5:00 pm on a friday, 7:00 am on a monday but 1:00 on a sunday. and again to drive there and to drive there alone. and we avoid car pooling and we avoid public transit because as one retired executive said we're cowboys and we like to get on our horse and go where we want to go and cowboys don't take the bus. [laughter]gfj >> that individualist streak that says that we prefer the individualism of the car to the% collectism of the public transit also translates into another

form of individualism that the automakers tap into which is our sense of self-identity and self-expression. they've convinced us that the car can say something about who we are. and a significant minority of americans do believe that their car communicates something about who they are or that if they had just the right car, one that really is them, that really is them, they would be in that car that expressed their true identity. this notion that the car can say something about us is not new. but the upsurge in car customizing that's happened over the last few years is evidence that it's growing. and that we are increasingly using cars as our social skin. as terence turner has put it. individualism sells so well that numerous automakers sell their models this way.

the honda element, the scion, the vw beetle and there's so many rebels and iconoclasts out there and they need a icono classic vehicle. the campaign urged buyers a couple of years ago to separate from the herd and buy the honda ridge line. but even this scion ad, the tag line of which is united by individuality points out the irony in trying to express yourself through a mass marketed vehicle. out of these hundred or so vehicles which i suppose look different and there are slightly different colors and slightly differently styling actually kind of look alike. they all have four wheels and a windshield. they all -- all of these, i

believe, drive by a gas-powered engine. and one of the things that a nissan marketing manager said to us is that when that company introduced their altima a few years ago in the first year of its sale they sold 100,000 cars. and they were very excited. this was a first big model for them in a while. and those 100,000 altima owners told nissan told them this car was built just for me. they convinced 100,000 people just that year they were buying a car for their individualistic self still most of us would have a hard time picking out a altima out of a lineup because a car is a car is a car. and it seems innocent enough to express yourself through your car. but what it's done over the last few years is truly force us into a conformity of overspending on our cars. we're spending more to get the

newest and the best in order to distinguish ourselves. we're loading on pricey options and accessories to distinguish ourselves. and even environmentally minded people who want to express their socially conscious identity and now we're talking about me. have been convinced to buy a new car that they didn't need because you had to buy the hybrid, didn't you? yes. even though most of the carbon footprint or at least a third of the carbon footprint will produce -- if you don't own a car that long is in the production. of that vehicle. so few of us are immune from this. this overspending has led the average price of the american car -- not a made in america but sold to us americans $26,000, which is about 25% higher in

inflation control dollars than it was a few decades ago when i got my license. this stunning car parked in front of this poof home is emblematic of how central the car or -- i should say cars because many of us have multiple vehicles have become to the american dream. and americans do believe still that the car can drive us toward opportunity and help us show it off when we get there. we were mystified initially by how -- when you buy a new car people tend to almost involuntarily say to you, congratulations. and at first we couldn't quite figure out why that was worthy of congratulations but once upon a time, it was. you earned. you saved. you bought a car.kód and it was representative of an achievement. and in those days gm works to set the stage for us. and first you bought the chevy and then you moved up the

corporate and social ladder. you got the buick. and if you got the full american dream, the cadillac. but the american car buyer like the american homeowner over the past decade has overextended themselves. and this has happened for a variety of reasons. some of which a result of the housing bubble because a lot of people drew on home equity to buy increasingly expensive cars. buying on credit not understanding the true costs of ownership. because we rarely total up the depreciation, the repairs, the maintenance, the insurance, the gasoline on a monthly basis and see how much it's truly costing us. on average $14,000 a year to own our two cars. and being pushed by dealers and financing sources to buy based on low monthly payments so that we become payment shoppers has

led us to overspend on our vehicles and get ourselves into financial trouble. congratulations on your debt would now be a more appropriate response. if somebody tells you to buy a new car, try that out. cars consume one-fifth of our household budget now. and not far behind housing. it's our second biggest household expense but we rarely see it that way because it's all divided up in little bits and pieces. for the poor, we often focus on carlessness as a problem but car ownership is a big problem for the working poor. who are working hard just to keep themselves in their car to get to work to get the paycheck to buy the car. or to continue to own the car. so car ownership is impoverishing many families. that one-fifth is average. so ifjw you're lower down on t income scale, your car portion of your budget is much bigger.

and the poor are paying more for cars not because their income is smaller but because they're being charged more. they are paying more for vehicles because they are subject to higher rates of dealer fraud,-o higher loan ra, often higher insurance rates simply because the zip code in which they live even if they are great drivers and tend to own older cars which are costly to maintain. there are plenty of outfits eager to take advantage of folks who are trying -- struggling to stay in their car. and rent a tire is one of these. a chain that will rent to you if you, for example, need a new set of tires to pass an inspection. and you can't afford the $450 say for a set of four tires at wal-mart, the cheapest set you can get. you can go to rent a tire and sign a nice contract. by the end of the year you will have paid perhaps over $2,000 for that set of four tires. family values.

back to the happy talk. family values are another american ideal that the automakers tap into. often with visions of family fun. although a surprising few number of our trips are to actually have fun. commuting, shopping, yes, errand-running, schools, yes. less than 3% of miles driven are on vacation. less than 1% of trips taken on vacation suggesting that perhaps this image should be used by hertz to rent us is car for those occasions rather than being sold to us. and we are buying based on these peak needs. automakers messages around safety also tap into our intense desire to be good parents. to be good heads of family. and parents meticulously pick out the best car seat.

they talk safety. they often even buy based on safety data. if we can afford it, we buy new cars for our teens because we think they will be safer new mexico.o'ñ when we were at the gm proving grounds we were invited to test-drive a new car that was being introduces -- introduced called the chevy traverse. the test-drive involved a series of little exercises in the traverse such as driving with a giant motor boat attached to the back. as you drive with this giant motor boat on the back do you feel in control? as you zip around these cones a little too fast, do you feel in control? when you speed up really fast and break to kick in the electronic stability control, do you feel in control? the question was asked over and over again and we realized we

were being asked do you feel safe. and cars are manufactured with the illusion of safety as they were marketed with any real safety benefits tangibly at our disposal. it's important to tlaelz the car is no friend to the family. a a lot of levels. and roughly half of air pollution being responsible from coming from automobiles is a big part of that. so we can credit asthma rates. we can credit lung disease, cancer, heart disease, stroke, many cases each year to the car. obviously if we think that we're sitting in the car for 18 1/2 hours a week, it's a major contributor to our obesity crisis. and the reality is that there's nothing more dangerous to children than cars. the number one killer of americans aged 1 to 34.

and these are the images that we rarely see. the roughly 40,000 fatalities a year. the roughly 2 1/2 million injuries a year which like in war, we tend to focus on the fatalities and ignore the injured. 2 1/2 million of them injured some cover in a couple days and some with lifelong debilitating injury. and the numbers have remained fairly steady year after year despite safety being added to the roads and cars. we can be thankful for the activists who have pushed for each innovation that the car companies have tended to resist in terms of adding safety equipment to our cars. from seatbelts to air bags to electronic stability control to antilock brakes. they have made cars safer but because we're driving more miles we are putting ourselves at risk.

and up until last year, those numbers have been fairly steady. last year we saw the first dip in fatalities. and that was due to the fact that americans were driving less. it's a hopeful sign because it means that we can drop the rate. but it also means safe driving means less driving. the final value i want to talk quickly about today is progress. americans' belief in technology as the salvation that is going to give us hope that car technology itself will solve many of the problems of the car. so we expect and hope that car engineers will make cars safer and that road engineers will make roads safer. we hope and expect that alternative fuels will soon eliminate the need for fossil fuels and that we'll be driving spectacularly streamlined

vehicles that will hover above the road. or maybe something a little less glamorous. even if we could convert our fleet today, if the 244 million vehicles that were on the road today suddenly could be fueled from your garden hose with water, many of the problems that i've talked about tonight would remain. the obesity problem would remain. the overspending problem would remain or get worse. the traffic problem would remain. the inequity problem would remain. the crash problem would remain. and so while we want to encourage development of alternative fuels and it will mitigate many of the problems of the car when we get there, one of the problems with looking ahead is that we don't look at what we can do now. and one of the things that we write about in the book is what we can do now. what can we realistically do now in terms of behavioral changes

and in terms of policy changes to improve our lifestyles? we're not going to get rid of cars. some of you are happy to hear that. we will not get rid of cars but there are some practical and small steps that families can take and there are bigger steps we need to push our government to take to make that happen. and the first thing we recommend is that people take a family snapshot in front of the car. look at how you're using your car. look at how often you're driving and to where and what trips can be removed and eliminated or combined. look at your car budget. really add it up. what are you spending? after you do those two things, you will not find it difficult at all then to think about downsizing. about moving to smaller vehicles next time you buy a car or trading in your larger vehicles or downsizing your fleet. removing one vehicle from your

fleet could save the average american family tens of thousands of dollars over the course of the decade. buying smart. understanding the schemes of the dealer. understanding how to finance in an intelligent way and a careful way. stepping back from the car, trying to drive less, finding ways to drive less and there are innumerable ones that don't require sacrifice. that actually can improve your life. many people who are -- have been forced on to public transit in this recession are finding it to be actually a very positive change and don't plan to go back when they can afford to go back to the car. changing your personal culture of driving. driving not just less but more safely, more sanely. finding the sweet spot when you're making major life changes, really thinking about that commute. deciding where to live. deciding where to work. looking as more people are now for bikable, walkable places to live. they are there.

they are out there. and people are moving to them. and then finally we recommend that people get political both on the local level where it can be as simple as looking to add sidewalks so that kids can walk to school. so that you can add pathways that will encourage bicycles. at the state level and at the federal level pushing for policy changes. understanding which of your leaders are receiving contributions from the oil and gas industry and from the car industry. and pushing perhaps for a different choice if they do. there are a lot of things that the government can do to shift spending from subsidies for oil and gas companies, from, for example, auto bailouts toward public transit. so we recommend a shift in spending. not necessarily more spending. but with that being said, i want to open the floor to questions.

and we have a young gentleman here with a mic. so if you do have a question -- and i call on you, if you could just wait for the mic to ask the question. and so we have someone here in the back row. [inaudible] >> it's very interesting. but what i really want to ask is i always hear people talking about the fact that americans are cowboys. and they're independent. and we like our freedom. but there was a time -- and i've read about it, i don't know, the turn of the last century when people really did enjoy jumping on a trolley car or getting on a train and socializing with people and traveling to where they were going. but then something happened. gm, firestone, all the companies interested in the car industry bought up the trolley companies. and proceeded to destroy them. rip up the tracks, destroy the cars.

and push their own product. in other words, we were sort of manipulated as a country into believing that we were cowboys and free. and we wanted our independenwzñ and we lost the culture of actually meeting people on a train or going out on a trolley and talking to people and being part of our culture. we sort of isolated ourselves in these boxes. and so -- i mean, i don't want to assume -- i don't think i want to assume that the american populist is fixated on the freedom. but i think we want to be with our fellow human beings, too, in a public transit setting. so i think the last one, get political, is a really very important point. ...

we have invested a lot of money in these cars we are driving so we have to do a little work to convince people that spending on public transit benefit them. the recession has been positive to the extent that people are realizing the human element of interaction. try it, you might like it. economic levels using this are

pushing for more of it. >> there is a question here. >> i have a question. it has nothing to do with the advancement of technology in the auto industry. when i was your kid, 15 miles -- everything is tired driven. 34 feet a second, the advancements in safety have caused accidents. they think they don't weigh

anything. talk a little bit about the lack of it. >> fatality rates have remained relatively stable despite safety improvements in cars. it has to do with the fact we are driving more but also what is known as risc compensation. i have those breaks and i am taking more risks. that has been a factor. seeing them made the cars more comfortable. the sound engineers make it nice and quiet in this luxurious little capsule. additional like that i couldn't charge that motorboat behind me. i felt in control of that giant boat.

many of the improvements have made us feel too save. the fact that we still have a desperate engine is shocking. you are absolutely correct. technology advancements and the fact that we are spending more money for morehouse -- hp and luxury. more electronics. >> with regard to what the gentleman said brings the point about driver education and these days progressively we are seeing less and less and driver education so people of operating these vehicles, i take issue with what you are saying about the number of accidents going up. maybe but as a percentage of the driven mile, the fatalities and

injuries have decreased as a result and it has the air bags to be stronger and everything else so doesn't get the gas mileage. >> cars are safer than they were. 40,000 people dying is 40,000 people dying. it is still something worth thinking about. a lot of our driving is discretionary. if we can reduce our driving by a significant percentage just because we had to, a lot of that was trips that people were realizing at didn't need to hop in the car at that point. if we reduce the miles we drive we can improve those numbers. is there question right here? >> i have a sense that in other

countries particularly in europe, people are less carjacked that we are in america. do you sense and if so can we learn something from those other countries? >> absolutely. we do have some good domestic models to look at. there are some localities in those things but generally to look at models to follow we have to look at europe and americans often don't like to look to europe. as an example of how we should run our country, in terms of public transit and consumer behavior, consumers are more practical. they baltimore-based on need than wants at least on the industry people we spoke to and in particular we talked to one

gentleman from volvo misspent quite an amount of time talking about how shocked he was by americans loading up on accessories. we can look to them as a consumer to said do we need to spend so much even if we have a car and we look to europe as a model for directing spending towards public transit and that may involve white male or high-speed trains. the countries are smaller. connecticut is not a big state. if we do these things locally and state-by-state they are doable. question here? >> technologically i agree with you that it is a wonderful idea to have reduced size of car not only environmentally friendly and so on but i was shocked

recently by a picture i saw in the new york times of a family that lived in their car because they were dispossessed from their house. this is i hope a temporary condition not because the banks that held the largest people in that position are not really ready to relent and give up the fact that these people i desolated and disadvantaged by the fact that they couldn't pay their mortgage. in such cases they are glad to have a large car but the entire family has to move in. that i hope is a temporary condition. the real issue i wanted to ask you about is, the distraction drivers have first due to cellphone, even though the fact that they have the ability to

converse by virtue of a microphone rather than directly into the phone itself does not necessarily mean they are driving more safely. we have a lot of access because one can be extremely emotionally involved while driving and the cellphone is not a device that should be used under those circumstances. the new york times also published today from the fact that computers are not just in laptops and desktops. they are going to be on-boards. what can the driver be doing? a computer on the dashboard, do you think that makes them a safer drivers? should he be driving a car when messing about with his computer?

there's a problem in this entire business, in lack of safety. >> we were asking about technology, in car technology, what they meant by that was the technology you are talking about. when someone who the salesman travels tens of thousands of miles a month for their job and actually work out of their car fleet renewal realtors come to mind as a real example. there might be a practical use to having a computer in your car but it doesn't need to be built

into it. all of these devices, even a simple radio can provide a distraction. we feel comfortable with all of these distractions because we get into them and we've become immune to the danger. we forget we are doing this incredibly complicated task that requires a lot of concentration and attention. we take it for granted and we try to do too many things and we in danger ourselves and others. >> the few things i am sure you are aware of are probably worth mentioning in the context, one is the length of miles traveled

by americans. 26%, 40%, 80% of by car. another area is our rail infrastructure which had a decimation of rail in the last 80 years, i think it is down by two thirds. one third that remains, very little of it is used for commuter rail or frequent service. from new haven to new york we have the busiest flying in the country and carry twice as many people every day as amtrak does nationwide. certainly people are more than willing especially to go to work

or recreation lead to go to new york on the weekends to take a car. why is that? people usually talk about the price of parking in new york. that is an issue -- a real issue this country faces. the adverse consequences of impervious service related to roads and automobiles and especially the parking spots for automobiles. those in cities other than new york those parking spaces take greater and greater percentage of the land area. hartford, conn, had a declining population over the last 30 years. since 1970 the number of parking

spaces has risen by 30%. i would also say the country has to set goals, where we are going. the rest of the world has an increase in car ownership. we are leveling off. we should really set the goal of reducing car ownership. you alluded to that. i will wrap up just to get a few comments and mention also to anyone in the audience who is interested, donald schubert who wrote high cost of free parking, speaking at the university at 7:00 p.m. on january 19th. that is a couple minutes away. >> your first point about how many trips are quite short and why do we do that?

it is habit. we hop in a car and don't think twice about it. once we start driving and become sedentary in that way, what seems like a short walk becomes long because we are not used to walking anymore. one of the things we recommend people do is keep a trip diary in their car. that could be as simple as a pad of yellow paper. how far away it is. so that people can see how many troops they are taking. they could walk or bike. it is a high percentage. those are not necessary trips. consider the irony of driving to the gym. my husband is not here because he would say the reason i don't drive to the gym is because i don't go to the gym. i don't have a lot of authority on that but there are a lot of shorter trips that are more helpful than walking and biking.

your second point on the need for greater public transit, our public transit system is thin. it is better in some places than others but we should be pushing for more of it. there is no reason why we shouldn't have a world-class public transit system. it is just that the spending has been directed towards the roads. that policy shift should happen. there were some stimulus funds directed to public transit but they pale in comparison to bailouts. we can take one or two more questions and there is one here. >> just wait for the mike. >> my grandchildren came from maine for thanksgiving. they were exhausted from the car

ride. when i suggested that we take a walk downtown there was this instant transformation. they ran out into the woods and dragged out sticks and stamped them apart. it was a wonderful liberating experience for them and for me. and my daughter. i would just love to have that example thought about. if we could just identify --

>> the walk to school with cheese to be a respite or an adventure, very few children walk to school even when they can. they are being driven. that is a reflection on the way we spend time with our children. there are better ways to spend time with your children. our children would be healthier if we encourage them to get out and walk or bike. we have a false sense of danger with respect to children because they are safer walking or biking to school and stay for taking a school bus than when they are driven by their own parents. we like that feeling of control. certainly they are much safer taking the school buses and driving themselves once they are

in high school. >> one last question right up front. >> thank you for your talk. you mentioned certain values of freedom and individuality and family values, none of which seem to pertain to our use of the car. i am wondering if this might somehow corresponds, if we are not doing these things, the car itself is a false symbol of -- even a dead symbol of these values. i am wondering if you could comment since it does work, i am

curious how you might comment on the possibility that we ourselves are living our lives as a kind of simulacrum. just that. >> when we say the car taps into these values, some of the aspects are real. the car does make us free in a car based society. you need the car to be free so it has created its own sense of providing the freedom that can prevent us from having. it embodies a host of contradictions. we can take our family on vacation. we want to. we devote too much of our energy to thinking that is why we are buying a certain vehicle when our uses are particularly different. we would do better to think of the car as the tool.

when we talk to auto marketers, there are the appliance people, there are some leaders the land the people who buy an emotion. most of us are buying on emotion. and should be thinking of little more like a washing machine. although they're getting pretty fancy these days too. i have to wrap it up but thank and thank you for giving me the opportunity to share with you. thank you. [applause] >> anne lutz fernandez is a former investment banker with 15 years' experie corporations. anne lutz fernandez is an anthropology professor at brown university. she has written or edited nine

books. >> speaking with robert -- robert moore iii about his book "i always said i would marry a white girl: coming to grips with race in america". let's start out with why -- who actually said you would marry a white girl? >> i think that was an internal feeling on my part. i grew up in a fascinating time period in a suburb in the 1960s. we were one of the few african-american families to ride the wave of millions of whites who left their america at that time period to go to the suburbs. at the same time many were coming out of rural america and going to the city. i felt very unique. very caught in between. two groups. like two sides.

it was a time period that was -- i felt internally that perhaps i was destined to marry someone who was white rather than african-american. >> the first part of your book is a different section. the first is called straddling the sand. how did you come to grips with your identity as an african-american growing up in a predominantly white area of philadelphia? >> it was tough. i still wrestle with the impact of the time period. i grew up with very good friends of mine, great friends in that time period, numerous stereotypes about african-americans and i internalized that. both my parents worked which was unusual in that time period. a dual income family.

tenth grade rolled around and i opted out of the public school system and went to a private school and had my first contact with african-americans. my first girlfriend in tenth grade was african-american. i had to leave and go someplace else and work on my identity. >> what do you think it means? what is an african-american? >> today? >> or what you felt growing up. >> that is an interesting question. we have stereotypes of each other. i subscribe to something called a group tradition theory. i look at groups in our society and their overall place in society and we hold stereotypes about groups and we internalized

those stereotypes. i was socialized as a middle-class person growing up in the suburbs of philadelphia. i am not sure anyone identity that whites have -- we do feel a sense of cultural difference whether it is real cultural difference or not. we feel a sense of in group versus out group. one day we will get over that in this country. >> why did you decide to write the book in the first place? >> i have a lot to get off my chest. my experiences were quite unique. i have three kids. having kids late in life. i did marry a white female and we now have for the first time in history a mixed race

movement, a biracial movement. a lot of my thoughts today centered around racial identity. i am fascinated by mixed race today. up until the past 30 years, past 25 years if you had any african-american ancestry -- this mixed race movement -- racial identity is with us. absolutely fascinating. i really wanted to dive into writing a book about how race changed over the last 35 years. >> what is the biggest thing you have seen today versus growing up in the 60s? >> it is questionable. many people think race relations have changed in a positive way and i question that tremendously. we have a massively segregated society. 86% of whites in the suburbs --

african-american residents, we think things have changed massively but the mixed race movement, how have my kids identified themselves growing up in an all white area in rural america? i am not sure mixed race identity -- it seems off the current polarization of african-americans and whites. there is great potential for those two groups to come together in the future. >> w have been talking with robert mooreiii, author of "i always said i would marry a white girl: coming to grips with race in america". >> howard zinn was an active supporter of the student

nonviolent coordinating committee in the civil-rights movement and wrote vietnam:the logic of withdrawal and disobedience in democracy. his book, ft people's history of the united states, sold a million copies since it was published in 1980. he died of heart attack in california when they, january 27th. he was 87 years old. howard zinn was a guest on booktv's in depth program in 2002. you can watch it on line on booktv.org. >> in his latest book a senior adviser to afghanistan and pakistan, vali nasr looks at the growth of the muslim middle class in the middle