A World of Their Own Making
Myth, Ritual, and the Quest for Family Values
Published on 15. October 1997
Book
Paperback/Softback
336 pages
978-0-674-96188-3 (ISBN)
Description
Our whole society may be obsessed with "family values," but as John Gillis points out in this entertaining and eye-opening book, most of our images of "home sweet home" are of very recent vintage. A World of Their Own Making questions our idealized notion of "The Family," a mind-set in which myth and symbol still hold sway. As the families we live with become more fragile, the symbolic families we live by become more powerful. Yet it is only by accepting the notion that our ritual, myths, and images must be open to perpetual revision that we can satisfy our human needs and changing circumstances.
Reviews / Votes
Synthesizes, in thoroughly readable prose, a tremendous amount of recent historical literature on Western family life from the Middle Ages to the present. This is no mean feat, and the fact that it undermines many loudly proclaimed political pieties is a delicious bonus. -- Warren Goldstein * Philadelphia Inquirer * Weddings, birthdays, funerals, reunions, Mother's Day, even Christmas--we think of these ritual events as timeless traditions, our links to the distant past and the future. As such, they become invested with a syrupy sentimentalism, both sweet and sticky--part of the current nostalgia for family values. John Gillis's twin gifts as a historian and a writer are to reveal just how modern and how politically constructed these rituals are and to tell their story with the narrative grace and flair of a born storyteller. A book both learned and entertaining. -- Michael Kimmel, author of <I>Manhood in America: A Cultural History</I> A tour de force of accessible scholarship, written with vigor and grace, filled with fascinating details and fresh insights...No one who cares about the past, present, or future of family life can afford to ignore this book. -- Jackson Lears, author of <I>Fables of Abundance: A Cultural History of Advertising in America</I>More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Cambridge, Mass
United States
Target group
College/higher education
Professional and scholarly
Illustrations
4 halftones
Dimensions
Height: 235 mm
Width: 152 mm
Weight
463 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-674-96188-3 (9780674961883)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
John R. Gillis is Professor of History at Rutgers University and author of For Better, For Worse: British Marriages, 1600 to the Present.
Content
Prologue Acknowledgments Introduction Different Times, Different Places: Meanings of Family and Home Before the Modern Age Myths of Family Past At Home with Families of Strangers Life and Death in a Small Parenthesis Enchanting Families: The Victorian Origins of Modern Family Cultures A World of Their Own Making Making Time(s) for Family No Place Like Home Mythic Figures in the Suburban Landscape The Perfect Couple Mothers Giving Birth to Motherhood Bringing Up Fathers: Strangers in Our Midst Haunting the Dead New Times and New Places: Myths and Rituals for a Global Era Conclusion: Remaking Our Worlds Notes Index