Our Worst Strength: American Individualism and Its Hidden Discontents - Hardcover

by James Richardson (Author)

We are all settlers on our own personal frontiers.

It's our national way of life. Individualism. America has now taken individualism to its logical extreme like no other society on Earth. And the results are mixed. Radical autonomy without wisdom and lots of social support is a dangerous gift. It can even become a curse of self-destruction.

This book explores how individualism affects the five major domains of American life that comprise 80% of our waking time - work, fun, food, friends, and family.

Using fresh national research on older Americans' life experiences, his training as a cultural anthropologist, and his own awkward life experiences, Dr. Richardson has crafted a first-of-its-kind social history of the late 20th century and what it yielded to us as a nation.

Part One - How to Make a Hyper-Individualistic Society in Seven Easy Steps

Part Two - How It Became Awkward at Work

Part Three - How We Got Lost in the American Fun-house

Part Four - How We Came To Eat Whatever, Whenever

Part Five - How We Turned Friends into Entertainment Devices

Part Six - How We Shriveled the American Family

Part Seven - The Future of Individualism in America

Dr. Richardson argues that individualism is not an inevitable way of life. We can take our gifts of autonomy and calibrate them to a more community-oriented future. We have to truly understand what we have before we make changes we would regret as a country.