Bright-Sided
How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America
Ehrenreich, Barbara
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BOOK SYNOPSIS
A sharp-witted knockdown of Americas love affair with positive thinking and an urgent call for a new commitment to realismAmericans are a positive peoplecheerful, optimistic, and upbeat: this is our reputation as well as our self-image. But more than a temperament, being positive, we are told, is the key to success and prosperity. In this utterly original take on the American frame of mind, Barbara Ehrenreich traces the strange career of our sunny outlook from its origins as a marginal nineteenth-century healing technique to its enshrinement as a dominant, almost mandatory, cultural attitude. Evangelical mega-churches preach the good news that you only have to want something to get it, because God wants to prosper you. The medical profession prescribes positive thinking for its presumed health benefits. Academia has made room for new departments of positive psychology and the science of happiness. Nowhere, though, has bright-siding taken firmer root than within the business community, where, as Ehrenreich shows, the refusal even to consider negative outcomeslike mortgage defaultscontributed directly to the current economic crisis. With the mythbusting powers for which she is acclaimed, Ehrenreich exposes the downside of Americas penchant for positive thinking: On a personal level, it leads to self-blame and a morbid preoccupation with stamping out negative thoughts. On a national level, its brought us an era of irrational optimism resulting in disaster. This is Ehrenreich at her provocative bestpoking holes in conventional wisdom and faux science, and ending with a call for existential clarity and courage.
AUTHOR BIO
Barbara Ehrenreich is the bestselling author of sixteen previous books, including the bestsellers Nickel and Dimed and Bait and Switch. A frequent contributor to Harpers and The Nation, she has also been a columnist at The New York Times and Time magazine.
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MORE BOOK INFO
ISBN: 0805087494
ISBN(13-digit): 9780805087499
Dewey Decimal: 155.2/32
Library of Congress: 2009023588
Book Publisher: Henry Holt & Co
Language: ENG
No. of Pages: 235
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