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Never Saw It Coming
People—especially Americans—are by and large optimists. They're much better at imagining best-case scenarios (I could win the lottery!) than worst-case scenarios (A hurricane could destroy my neighborhood!). This is true not just of their approach to imagining the future, but of their memories as well: people are better able to describe the best moments of their lives than they are the worst. Though there are psychological reasons for this phenomenon, Karen A.Cerulo, in Never Saw It Coming, considers instead the role of society in fostering this attitude. What kinds of communities develop this pattern of thought, which do not, and what does that say about human ability to evaluate possib...
Identity Designs
National symbols, modern totems with ancient roots, remain entities for which men and women continue to march, debate, fight, and die. Modern political leaders still drape their campaigns in such symbols; modern revolutionaries still defile them. Identity Designs explores the source of this long-standing power--the way national symbols are selected, the manner in which their meaning is conveyed, their potential effects, and the sustenance of their power. In particular, the book charts the role of design in the selection of symbolic images, thus demonstrating that symbols are chosen not just for what they convey, but how they convey their message. Karen Cerulo shows that the symbolic designs ...
Dreams of a Lifetime
How social status shapes our dreams of the future and inhibits the lives we envision for ourselves Most of us understand that a person’s place in society can close doors to opportunity, but anything is possible when we dream about what might be, or so we think. Dreams of a Lifetime reveals that what and how we dream—and whether we believe our dreams can actually come true—are tied to our social class, gender, race, age, and life events. Karen Cerulo and Janet Ruane argue that our social location shapes the seemingly private and unique life of our minds. We are all free to dream about possibilities, but not all dreamers are equal. Cerulo and Ruane show how our social position ingrains i...
Culture in Mind
What is thought and how does one come to study and understand it? How does the mind work? Does cognitive science explain all the mysteries of the brain? This collection of fourteen original essays from some of the top sociologists in the country, including Eviatar Zerubavel, Diane Vaughan, Paul Dimaggio and Gary Alan Fine, among others, opens a dialogue between cognitive science and cultural sociology, encouraging a new network of scientific collaboration and stimulating new lines of social scientific research. Rather than considering thought as just an individual act, Culture in Mind considers it in a social and cultural context. Provocatively, this suggests that our thoughts do not function in a vacuum: our minds are not alone. Covering such diverse topics as the nature of evil, the process of storytelling, defining mental illness, and the conceptualizing of the premature baby, these essays offer fresh insights into the functioning of the mind. Leaving the MRI behind, Culture in Mind will uncover the mysteries of how we think.
Deciphering Violence
In the current information age, Americans are bombarded daily with stories and images portraying a rising tide of violence. Drawing on media that includes television, newspaper, fiction, film, painting and photography, as well as interviews and focus groups, Karen Cerulo explores the ways in which individuals think about, depict and evaluate violence. Moving beyond typical studies that focus on violent story content, Deciphering Violence decodes the role of story structure itself and how the sequencing of facts can systematically influence our moral judgements of violent acts. The book identifies institutionalized forms of violent storytelling and raises new possibilities both for decreasing public tolerance of violence and increasing social control of the phenomenon.
Second Thoughts
Co-authored by Karen A. Cerulo, the Eastern Sociological Society’s Robin L. Williams Lecturer for 2013-2014 Do birds of a feather flock together or do opposites attract? Is honesty the best policy? Are children our most precious commodity? Is education the great equalizer? Adages like these shape our social life. This Sixth Edition of Second Thoughts reviews several popular beliefs and notes how these conventional wisdoms cannot be taken at face value, but instead require careful second thoughts. This unique text encourages students to step back and sharpen their analytic focus with 25 essays that use social research to expose the gray areas of commonly held beliefs, revealing the complexity of social reality and sharpening students’ sociological vision.
Second Thoughts
Learning More About It Exercises SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS: THE ECONOMY Essay 20 Welfare Is Ruining This Country A frequently expressed opinion when talk turns to welfare reform is that too many people are on the dole and too many recipients have other options. In this essay, we review some of the least understood dimensions of welfare and explore exactly where welfare moneys are going. Learning More About It Exercises Essay 21 Immigrants Are Ruining This Nation?Why don?t you go back where you came from?? This angry cry seems to be getting more and more familiar as the United States faces the highest levels of immigration in its history. Is immigration ruining this nation? This essay reviews the h...
Superconnected: The Internet, Digital Media, and Techno-Social Life
What does it mean to live in a superconnected society? Superconnected: The Internet, Digital Media, and Techno-Social Life, Second Edition brings together the latest research from many relevant fields to examine how contemporary social life is mediated by various digital technologies: the internet, social media, and mobile devices. The book explores such topics as how digital technology led to the modern information age, information sharing and surveillance, how digital media shape socialization and development of the self, digital divides that separate groups in society, and the impact of digital media across social institutions. The author’s clear, nontechnical discussions and interdisci...
Concise Encyclopedia of Comparative Sociology
The Concise Encyclopedia of Comparative Sociology presents the current state of knowledge in comparative sociology for students, scholars, and the educated lay public. The major aim of comparative sociological research is to identify similarities and differences among societies, studying variation across both geographical regions and historical periods. This volume is divided into six broad categories: Theoretical and Methodological Issues in Comparing Societies, Comparative Historical Sociology, Comparing Institutions and Social Structures, Comparing Social Processes, Comparing Nation States and World Regions, and Biographies of Exemplary Comparative Sociologists. Nearly 60 essays written b...
Mind, Modernity, Madness
A leading interpreter of modernity argues that our culture of limitless self-fulfillment is making millions mentally ill. Training her analytic eye on manic depression and schizophrenia, Liah Greenfeld, in the culminating volume of her trilogy on nationalism, traces these dysfunctions to society’s overburdening demands for self-realization.
