Noreen Malone is my new favorite person. I just followed her on Twitter. Really, I did.
I love her article on the problem with name-dropping book acknowlegements. Apparently, Sheryl Sandberg has set a new record.
Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In hasn’t even been published yet, and already it’s sparked a national conversation about modern feminism. Though worthy, this has obscured the national conversation we should really be having.Lean In exposes a vein of something truly endemic and toxic in our culture. I refer, of course, to the current ridiculous state of the “Acknowledgments” section, which has perhaps reached its nadir in Sandberg’s work. Lean in, and drop a name.
Apt. 11d 
Well, if I ever write a book, I will be sure to thank Laura.
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My favorite part: I only wish my severely under-cared-for jade plant could have survived to see its publication—thank you to it, as well, for the sacrifice in service of this larger project of journalism.
HAHAHAHAH! Awesome.
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I *love* acknowledgements pages. When you read 20th century literary criticism and realize who knew whom and how, it’s great stuff. Very gossipy.
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Ok, true confession time. I thanked my cat in the acknowledgements of my dissertation without mentioning that he was my cat. No one questioned it. I think my advisor thinks I was thanking a live-in boyfriend.
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Attempting to wean the family off of Thrift Shop, to which we have all become addicted, dirty lyrics and all. This version is cleaner, and also from the 1920s.
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In her defense, maybe all those people really really helped her?
I think the name-dropping conjunction of people from different endeavors is interesting (academia, entertainment, tech world, book publishing, . . . .). Does the 20th century literary criticism acknowledgements look like that, too?
I’m inclined to see it as a new trend, that the elite of every field will know each other (because wealth breeds its own elitism, because of TED, because the elite in everything become celebrities to some extent these days in the time of easy exposure — like who would expect Adam Schwartz to have been a public figure? ). But, whenever one things a trend is new it’s wise to remember that there’s nothing new under the sun.
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We’ll ALL thank Laura in our future books – deal?
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“…thank you to it, as well, for the sacrifice in service of this larger project of journalism.”
Now Sandberg’s just trolling.
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