THE
GREAT BRAIN SUCK:
And Other American
Epiphanies
a new book by
Eugene Halton
University of Chicago Press, forthcoming, 2008
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The University of Chicago Press book description:
More and more information is pumped into our media-saturated world
every day, yet Americans seem to know less and less. In a
society
where who you are is defined by what you buy, and where we
prefer
to experience reality by watching it on TV, Eugene Halton
argues
something has clearly gone wrong.
Luckily Halton, with scalpel-sharp wit in one hand and the
balm of wisdom in the other, is here to operate on the
declining body
politic. His initial diagnosis is bleak: fast food and too
much time
spent sitting, whether in our cars or on our couches, are
ruining our
bodies, while our minds are weakened by the proliferation of
electronic devices—TVs, computers, cell phones, iPods, video
games—and their alienating effects. If we are losing the
battle between
autonomy and automation, he asks, how can our culture regain
self-sufficiency? Halton finds the answer in the inspiring
visions—deeply
rooted in American culture—of an organic and more spontaneous
life
at the heart of the work of master craftsman Wharton
Esherick,
legendary blues singer Muddy Waters, urban critic Lewis
Mumford,
and artist Maya Lin, among others.
A scathing and original jeremiad against modern materialism,
The Great Brain Suck is also a series of epiphanies of
a simpler but
more profound life.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
1. The Great Brain Suck
2. Out of the Fifties
3. Go Man Go
4. The Hunter-Gatherers’ World’s Fair
5. Life, Literature, and Sociology in Turn-of-the
Century Chicago
6. Communicating Democracy: Or Shine, Perishing
Republic
7. Lem’s Master’s Voice
8. An American Epiphany in Nashville
9. The House on Mount Misery
10. The Art and Craft of Home
11. Europiphanies
12. The Last Days of Lewis Mumford
13. Teleparodies
14. His One Leg
Notes
Acknowledgments
Index
Subjects:
- CULTURE STUDIES
- LITERATURE AND LITERARY
CRITICISM: General Criticism and Critical Theory
- PHILOSOPHY: Aesthetics
- PHILOSOPHY: Philosophy of
Society
- RELIGION: Religion and
Society
- SOCIOLOGY: Sociology of
Arts--Leisure, Sports
- SOCIOLOGY: Theory and
Sociology of Knowledge
Eugene Halton
photo by Gemma Halton