Tables Away from Home

This chapter focuses on table conversations that take place outside the home. More specifically, it considers in-depth cases of how our civic selves are developed through conversations in a variety of settings such as friends' homes, schools, camps, colleges, religious institutions, firehouses, addiction-recovery programs, gang prevention programs, and the military. After discussing commensality and conversation found at school tables, the chapter examines table talk that transpires at camp tables, college tables, religious tables, male tables, homies dinners, military meals, and at meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous and other programs for recovering addicts. It shows that people gathered at tables away from home emulate domestic tables by re-creating “family” or “comfort” or “safety,” all of which help an individual find his/her voice in conversations.