American Nerd - Benjamin Nugent

American Nerd is a non-fiction exploration of the origins of the term and the concept of the nerd in America. Nugent, a self-proclaimed nerd, appears to have at one time attempted to shun his nerdish tendencies, but has now whole-heartedly embraced them. Nugent's chapters focus on different aspects of nerd evolution in American language, portrayal in media, and case studies in debate and Dungeons & Dragons. There is not, however, a seamless thesis about nerd culture and identity (not that there need be one uniform answer to the question of: What is a nerd?), and at times it felt as if the thoughts were a bit haphazard. Nugent also seems unsure of whether he wants to write a serious analytic piece, or whether he just wants to use the subject as a vehicle to examine his own existence and to atone for the wrong he inflicted upon other nerds as an adolescent. Mostly, this was a reminder to me of how cruel people can be to those who are different - or perhaps just not good at/interested in sports. I did appreciate Nugent's popular culture references though and saw much of myself in his descriptions - mostly in ways that I am actually quite proud of.