Ancestor worship, or filial piety so characteristic of Asian cultures, for example, does not really resonate with Americans who favor children, not grandparents.

Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

Life, it seems, is nothing if not a series of initiations, transitions, and incorporations.

My academic identity is that of a folklorist, and for many years I have taught only folklore courses.

In my introductory course, Anthropology 160, the Forms of Folklore, I try to show the students what the major and minor genres of folklore are, and how they can be analyzed.

Future orientation is combined with a notion and expectation of progress, and nothing is impossible.

Americans often have trouble enjoying the present moment.

I mentioned that one of the tripartite formulas in American worldview involves time: past, present, and future.

Americans have a penchant for the future and tend to disregard the past.

Polls are frequently taken to try to tease out or determine likely directions and trends, but once taken, they belong to the past, requiring that new polls be taken.

Since Graham Bell came up with telephony, it took 100 years for the way the technology has impacted our lives, the way we perceive the world.

We must never neglect the patient's own use of his symptoms.

Each opening bud, and care-perfected seed, Is as a page, where we may read of God.

I think it's insane, absolutely insane for a person to have one of the highest and most important jobs in the entire world to be saying that he has to be at his children's soccer practice.

I'll never harden my heart but I've toughened the muscles around it.

If I do my full duty, the rest will take care of itself.

If the people of the Middle East are not sure what democracy means, let them look to Israel.

Smog is affecting larger parts of China, and environmental pollution has become a major problem, which is natures red-light warning against the model of inefficient and blind development.

Stage acting is a very difficult thing - and I've learned a lot and have a long way to go.

Like my mum, I sometimes buy things I shouldn't and fill my house with rubbish.