Sex, Economy, Freedom & Community: Eight Essays

Sex, Economy, Freedom & Community: Eight Essays

In this new collection of essays, Wendell Berry continues his work as one of Americaâ€™s most necessary social commentators. With wisdom and clear, ringing prose, he tackles head-on some of the most difficult problems which face us as we near the end of the twentieth century.
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Berry begins the title essay with the Anita Hillâ€“Clarence Thomas hearings as an example of a â€œprocess that has been well established and well respected for at least two hundred yearsâ€”the process . . . of community disintegration.â€ Community, a â€œlocally understood interdependence of local people, local culture, local economy, and local nature,â€ bound by trust and affection, is â€œbeing destroyed by the desires and ambitions of both private and public life which for want of the intervention of community interests, are also destroying one another.â€
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He then moves on to elucidate connections between sexual brutality and economic brutality, and the role of art and free speech. Berry forcefully addresses Americaâ€™s unabashed pursuit of self-liberation, which he says is â€œstill the strongest force now operating in our society.â€ As individuals turn away from their community, they conform to a â€œrootless and placeless monoculture of commercial expectations and products,â€ buying into the very economic system which is destroying the earth, our communities, and all they represent.
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Throughout the book Berry asks, What is appropriate? What is worth conserving from our past and preserving in our present? What is it to be human and truly connected to others? What does it mean to be free?
Country USA
Manufacturer Pantheon
Binding Paperback
ReleaseDate 1994-09-13
UnitCount 1
EANs 9780679756514

Country	USA
Manufacturer	Pantheon
Binding	Paperback
ReleaseDate	1994-09-13
UnitCount	1
EANs	9780679756514

Sex, Economy, Freedom & Community: Eight Essays

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