The Amish: How They Survive

A self-declared follow-up to John Ruth's award-winning The Amish: A People of Preservation (VL-4/93), which offered a profile of the oldest Amish community in America in Lancaster, PA, Burton Buller's lovingly photographed The Amish: How They Survive focuses on the world's largest Amish community in central Ohio, not only offering a portrait of daily life, but also illustrating how the Amish have adjusted to the realities of modernity without abandoning their core beliefs. Specifically, the film examines shift among the Amish from agriculture, which can no longer sustain the community, to business (most notably high-end furniture production)—a change that necessitates special arrangements. In fact, one of the most significant points the film makes is that individual Amish communities determine their own regulations (within given parameters, of course), and the Ohioans have developed interpretations that allow for these adaptations, not only in regards to business matters but in the areas of education and medical treatment as well. Still, Buller (whose narration is a bit leaden) makes it clear that in many respects—from dress and modes of transport to community activities such as barn-raisings—the Amish remain committed to their underlying principles even while finding ways of remaining economically viable in this new century. Recommended. [Note: the companion volume The Amish: Back Roads to Heaven is also newly available at the same price—or $69.95 for both films.] Aud: C, P. (F. Swietek)