I interviewed Ben, a 30-year-old office manager at a company that sold $2 million dollars’ worth of product per year on a popular online auction website. He sat at his computer under electric fluorescent lights during our conversation. Ben used a flip phone, a computer, and the internet at work. In his church, cell phones were allowed. He said, “I wouldn’t take my cell phone to church or answer it at church or show it to the neighbor and say, ‘Look at what I’ve got,’ if their church doesn’t allow it. You have to use it respectfully.” Ben also believed strongly that if used responsibly, technology “was not a big deal.” He thought that technology was going to keep on moving forward, though, and it was useful in running a successful business. Sure, he said, he and his employer (a family member) wanted to keep their close-knit community together, but they also believed that “you have to make the most of what you have, and this is what we have.” He said, “You know, we can do this without the technology, but why would we? We’re using technology in a way that doesn’t conflict with our morals.”

At the beginning of my fieldwork in one settlement, I was accompanied to a few interviews by the director of a local historical society and museum, who helped get me acquainted with the community. The director was with me when I interviewed Dennis, a successful business owner whose construction company had a website. He told us how he owned (but did not drive) trucks for his business. He described his multiple travels to Europe on a luxurious cruise ship. He told us that he liked the “classy” things in life and impressed us with his extensive volunteer work on numerous elite community and bank boards of directors. His wife used a smartphone at home to keep in touch with family members who lived far away, and his three sons were co-owners of the business now too.

Getting to know Dennis and other Amish businessmen showed me that even the most advanced and savvy adopters of new digital technologies believed strongly that they should use technologies in ways that reflected Amish values and lifestyle choices. They did this as a show of respect for the church and its members. Likewise, Amish library patrons consume information and media in ways that generally align with Amish (and in many cases rural American conservative) values. Instead of owning media or paying for unlimited access to “worldly content,” Amish people go to the library, which makes access temporary and inconvenient when compared to the option of owning content.

It seemed to me as an outside observer that new ways of using digital technologies and accessing information do not seem to indicate that the demise of Amish bonds and culture are on the horizon. On the contrary, informal social constraints seem more powerful in regulating behavior and protecting cultural autonomy than the church’s communally ratified rules. Certainly these forces are compatible and work together to moderate the assimilation of the Amish to the outside world, as noted earlier. Additionally, there are many cherished points of connection, unrelated to technology, that help keep the community together. These include small-scale church services located in the home; time for lunch and fellowship after the service; and a shared history, heritage, language, and common values (or even just the appearance of common values). All these act as symbols that show allegiance and deference to the Amish church. They work to define and reinforce the evolving geographical and informational boundaries that separate the Amish from the non-Amish and act as markers of group identity, helping members of the community feel rooted and known.

It should be noted that the process by which the widespread adoption of Amish workarounds occurs is often contested and negotiated within Amish communities and differs across districts and settlements. There are still noteworthy observable large-scale similarities and patterns, however, that apply across localized areas of difference.

IN MY FIELDWORK it was common for participants to tell me about their work, give me a tour of their workshop, and show me how they made whatever it was that they produced. On one occasion, I showed up unexpectedly at a machine shop to interview its owner, 70-year-old Paul. My close contact Noah suggested that I visit him. I assigned no special importance to the recommendation because Noah often connected me with people in his settlement. Noah did not give me any specific information about why he thought that Paul would be a good person for me to talk to. Later, however, I learned that Paul was something of a celebrity in the community.

Paul was very humble and unassuming. On the winter day when I showed up at the workshop, which was located across the street from his house, I walked into a dark but warm retail store where small metal contraptions such as hardware, carabiners, lamp parts, plumbing parts, and spare machine parts were for sale. After explaining to the Amishman behind the counter who I was and why I was there, I asked if Paul was available for an interview. He told me he was. While I waited for Paul, I admired an old wood stove that warmed the room. Although it looked old, I learned that it had recently been converted to burn natural gas instead of wood. The items for sale in the shop were obviously highly specialized but mostly unidentifiable to my untrained eye. A few customers came in to chat with the clerk as I perused the merchandise.

When Paul was ready, we went back to his office. He was a slight man with a gray beard and bright, engaging eyes. I quickly realized that Paul was used to providing tours of his business. Over the course of an hour, he showed me his machine workshop and his design studio where he created custom, handcrafted machines from scratch. On his business card, it says that the business is composed of machinists and steel fabricators. They manufacture farm equipment including “hose assembly and fittings, power transmission products” and “all types of pneumatic components.” On the day that I visited, just before lunch, it appeared that there were 10 other employees working in a large shop with about 20 different pneumatic machines. (Paul and his colleagues used them to create other machines.) Paul and his coworkers built custom machines for highly specialized tasks. Some of the machines were electronic, and some were hydraulic or pneumatic—made for non-Amish as well as Amish customers. His workshop, however, was powered entirely by hydraulics and pneumatics; there was no electric power used to operate computers, lights, or mechanical devices of any kind.