In a timely and thoughtful examination, Richard Kyte explores the places that nurture our souls and make up the bedrock of our communities. Third Places can range from a neighborhood tavern, to a community center, to a local bookstore or coffee shop. They are the critical gathering spaces where friendships are formed, relationships are nurtured, and the tapestry of community is woven.
Yet, for an ever-growing list of reasons, many people today find themselves without a third place of their own. At a time when our nation is facing an epidemic of loneliness, when communities are suffering from loss of trust, low levels of engagement, despair, and political polarization, what if the answer to many of our problems lies in a simple idea? What if we just need to pay attention to the places where we find ourselves?
Forthcoming June 2024
“Richard Kyte’s plea to find a place in our lives for friendship could not be more timely. He weaves together storytelling, literature, and empirical evidence in a book that reminds us that simple fellowship is the first step to solving many of the problems facing our communities and our world.”
-Dr. Stephanie A Urchick, Rotary International President, 2024-2025
“Kyte shows us the essential role of third places, like an underground aquifer that allows the flourishing of all. Finding A Third Place is about finding ourselves, finding the taproot of a common life, finding the very foundations of being human, together.”
-Dr. Amy Oden, Author of Right Here, Right Now: The Practice of Christian Mindfulness
“Rick Kyte offers a timely call for the kind of institutions we most need to create solidarity in a time of growing polarization and loneliness. Third places are where ‘strangers can become acquaintances.’ They are essential institutions for Tocquevillian democracy. Very fitting for a book that began in a coffeehouse called Common Grounds.”
-Beau Weston, Van Winkle Professor of Sociology, Centre College
“I devoured this book in one sitting after visiting a beloved, isolated and very sick 91-year-old friend in the hospital and seeing his face light up with joy when we arrived. As Richard Kyte observes, ‘It is in conversation that we find belonging.’ Read this lovely, thoughtful book and then go out and engage. With someone, anyone—whether it’s a cherished old friend who needs you at a dire moment, or a complete stranger who is searching for a light in life—wherever it is that you connect. It will help you. It will help them. And that help will cascade in crucial ways that will fill you with joy and purpose.”
-Lisa Napoli, Author of Ray and Joan and Radio Shangri-La
Intervals of Hesitation collects four years of Richard Kyte’s continuing series of columns on the ethical life written for the LaCrosse Tribune. These essays range across diverse contemporary and perennial topics, from friendship to football, ecology to racism, leadership to bluegrass. Throughout, Kyte writes with insight, candor, clarity, and wit. His overriding purpose is not to take sides or argue for a point-of-view but to invite us to think through ethical problems. By doing so he demonstrates that moral reasoning inspires both personal integrity and civic virtue. Kyte’s essays invite us to step back from conflict and confusion, to pause in reflection, and experience what Simone Weil has called an “interval of hesitation,” in which we can recognize ourselves and our shared community with others.
Ideas Unite, Issues Divide collects four years’ worth of editorials Richard Kyte has written for the La Crosse Tribune on the topic of the ethical life. These essays examine contemporary and perennial moral conflicts in light of their underlying philosophical ideas. They aspire to contribute to everyday conversation about right and wrong, about virtue and misconduct, not by taking sides but by arguing that such conversation itself is the essence of the good, well-lived life. Ranging from education to ecology, bullying to political speech, drones to boat-building, these essays persuade us that chief among the urgent issues of our day is the thoughtful examination of our own lives.
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In Ethical Business: Cultivating the Good in Organizational Culture, Richard Kyte provides a handbook for navigating the challenges of today's business world. He offers a proven and accessible method for thinking through complicated problems on one's own, reaching consensus within groups, and communicating controversial decisions to others, which combine to demonstrate the way a virtuous office culture can yield ethical decision making.
"The ethical businesses that Kyte describes reap the rewards of attracting more productive employees, more loyal customers, and more committed investors. Kyte provides a blueprint for building companies and brands in sync with today's increasingly socially conscious consumers."
--Frank J. Oswald, Columbia University
Ethical thinking is a skill, one that everyone is capable of learning and developing. Richard Kyte's 'Four-Way Method for Ethical Decision-Making'--a logical, intuitive approach that relies on native abilities--shows students how it's possible to work out complex ethical problems on their own, no sophisticated theories necessary. Most important, readers will discover that the skill of ethical reasoning can be practically employed to live their lives more fully, more meaningfully, and well.
"First-rate, . . . wonderfully accessible, deeply informed, and genuinely constructive. . . . I warmly recommend this fresh and engaging book to anyone looking for a balanced and student-friendly introductory text in ethics."
--James G. Hanink, Loyola Marymount University