Book Reviews

At Home in the World:

Globalization and the Peace Corps in Nepal

James F. Fisher

2013, 218 pp., 21 b & w illustrations, endnotes, bibliography, index, 22 x 14 cm., softcover.

ISBN-13: 978-974-524-157-2 $25.00

At Home in the World:

Book review by Jerry Young

(Friends of Nepal. Iss. 17, December 2013)

I was a member of the first group of 70 Peace Corps Volunteers to go to the Himalayan kingdom of Nepal in the fall of 1962. We were answering the idealistic challenge that President Kennedy laid down in his first inaugural address, “Ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.” It was the New Frontier and during our two years of Peace Corps experience in Nepal, we would all come to realize the challenge was far more than any of us could possibly have known. It would transform us, change our world view and impact the rest of our lives in profound ways.
   Now, fifty years later, a book has been written about that experience. The book is titled At Home in the World: Globalization and the Peace Corps in Nepal by James F. Fisher, who himself was a member of that first Nepal Peace Corps group. It is not, however, just a collection of personal anecdotes.
   The author expertly places individual experiences and stories of the Nepal I Volunteers within a global context. He did this by carefully discussing globalization early in the book, then relates the specific volunteer experiences, and closes with summarizing how they fit within that context.
   The author spent several years visiting, individually interviewing, and recording as many of the former Nepal I volunteers as possible. He has included numerous direct quotes in the book, which lends an authenticity as told in their own words.
   As one who lived the experience I am grateful to the author for undertaking the considerable effort to write this book. As he told me during my interview with him, “It was too important a story not to tell.” I am further grateful to him for choosing a project that I helped organized in my Peace Corps village as the cover for the book.
   The 200-page book, including pictures, is well worth reading for anyone interested in a firsthand account of the early Peace Corps experience and its place within the global context.

[Read a review from the Asian Highland Perspective] [Read a review from the The Kathmandu Post] [Read a review from the Peace Corps Volunteers] [More Orchid Press Reviews]