Faded Mosaic: The Emergence of Post-Cultural America

(Paperback)

Publishing Details

Classifications

Physical Properties

Description

Contrary to today's widespread emphasis on cultural diversity, the United States has become not a multicultural society but the world's first post-cultural society. Cultures, Christopher Clausen argues, have lost power over both public and private behavior. This largely unrecognized transformation has enormous importance for every area of American life, from marriage to politics. One of its most prevalent social expressions is an aimless, conformist individualismbecause there is no longer any source of authority or value outside the self. The multiculturalism of leftist politics and the family values of the right are both futile expressions of nostalgia for a world (differently interpreted, of course) that is gone forever. In Faded Mosaic, Mr. Clausen brings his analysis down to earth with telling illustrations from contemporary life. He demonstrates how the moral demands and collective identities of America's native and immigrant cultures have vanished. In striking contrast to societies of the past, he declares, the United States today has neither one big culture nor many smaller ones, only a dizzying mixture of freedom and nostalgia. Original and penetrating, a serious critique.... It is the great virtue of Faded Mosaic that Mr. Clausen describes our present condition without hysterics or posturingbut with the caution, objectivity and concern that the subject deserves. Eric Cohen, Wall Street Journal

Reviews

Clausen treats these crucial questions with acumen, balance, and unpedantic style. -- Peter Heinegg * America: The Jesuit Review of Faith & Culture *
A crucial addition to the multi-culturalist debate...describes modern American life with disheartening accuracy. -- Eric Adler * Partisan Review *
A provocative book that sets forth an uncomfortable truth: a cafeteria culture will serve nothing but junk food. -- Bill Marx * The Boston Globe *
A bracing antidote...Faded Mosaic is no mere exercise in semantic hairsplitting but an argument to me a most persuasive one that in these United States at this point in its history culture does not exist. -- Jonathan Yardley * The Review of Higher Education *
Original and penetrating...a serious critique of America and its mass identity crisis. -- Eric Cohen * The Wall Street Journal *

Author Bio

Christopher Clausen is professor of English at the Pennsylvania State University and lives in State College, Pennsylvania. He has also written My Life with President Kennedy and The Place of Poetry.