You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.9 AVERAGE
3.9 AVERAGE
informative
reflective
medium-paced
informative
medium-paced
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
fast-paced
informative
mysterious
medium-paced
informative
medium-paced
funny
informative
reflective
an example about why it's not really very helpful to generalize groups and how it can contribute to dehumanization, unchecked growth of genuinely dangerous groups, and avoidance of critical thinking to avoid discomfort
dark
funny
informative
reflective
medium-paced
Super interesting insight into the linguistics of cults, in their many forms.
Never realised how similar the language of mlm schemes and actual cult leaders were, I’m going to be so hyper-aware of the way people and adverts and the world communicates now.
Never realised how similar the language of mlm schemes and actual cult leaders were, I’m going to be so hyper-aware of the way people and adverts and the world communicates now.
I was expecting a book on the language of political fanaticism (which is part of my own research area) and wondered how a former writer for Cosmo and Glamour would have much to say, but it is, in fact, actually about cults. The author was in her late 20s when she wrote this book during 2020, and her world is very different from mine, in so many ways – I know little about urban living for members of her generation!
Chapter One is an overview of “brainwashing” and other long-standing ideas about the appeal of cults, and Chapter Two tells the history of Jonestown, Heaven’s Gate, and Synanon – the author’s father was raised in Synanon though snuck out to attend high school and eventually became a neuroscientist. Chapter Three describes Scientology. The other three chapters are about more everyday phenomena that a great many people are engaged with, which aren’t considered cults and aren’t necessarily harmful either, although there are strong cult-like elements, and many people do take things too far. Chapter Four is on multilevel marketing and other legal pyramid schemes, Chapter Five is on emotionally manipulative fitness groups, and Chapter Six is on social media influencers, especially New Age “gurus” and QAnon.
Where does language fit in? She has two main themes, which are common to each of these groups. One is that the group will often have its own idiosyncratic terms for things that could be described perfectly well using ordinary language – people need to learn and use those terms to become part of the in-group. The other is a phenomenon called the “thought-terminating cliché” by Robert Lifton – it’s a phrase that can be used to shut down deeper or more critical thinking on a given topic. Examples include, “Well, it’s in God’s hands” or “It is what it is” or “Everything happens for a reason.”
The book is very interesting and written in a friendly, casual tone, but I wish the author had taken the idea of research a little more seriously. She’s quoting experts and has a carefully collected set of endnotes, referring readers to her sources, which is great, but I wish she had been a bit more thorough. Rather than telling us about an article in Psychology Today, for example, it would give her work a bit more gravitas to cite the article writer’s academic papers. At one point, she tells us that the author Tara Isabella Burton wrote that religions provide us with meaning, purpose, a sense of community, and ritual, and I have no doubt that Burton did say such things in the book our author is citing – but presumably in that book Burton also explained that this list of what religions do actually originated with Emile Durkheim, the founder of sociology. Attributing the list to Burton rather than Durkheim makes the author seem naïve, overly rushed, or sloppy – it would have only taken her a moment to get the information from the Internet.
With those caveats, if you’re interested in quirky and sometimes dangerous ways that modern humans influence each other through our desires to feel connected, this book can be a good and often fun introduction.
Chapter One is an overview of “brainwashing” and other long-standing ideas about the appeal of cults, and Chapter Two tells the history of Jonestown, Heaven’s Gate, and Synanon – the author’s father was raised in Synanon though snuck out to attend high school and eventually became a neuroscientist. Chapter Three describes Scientology. The other three chapters are about more everyday phenomena that a great many people are engaged with, which aren’t considered cults and aren’t necessarily harmful either, although there are strong cult-like elements, and many people do take things too far. Chapter Four is on multilevel marketing and other legal pyramid schemes, Chapter Five is on emotionally manipulative fitness groups, and Chapter Six is on social media influencers, especially New Age “gurus” and QAnon.
Where does language fit in? She has two main themes, which are common to each of these groups. One is that the group will often have its own idiosyncratic terms for things that could be described perfectly well using ordinary language – people need to learn and use those terms to become part of the in-group. The other is a phenomenon called the “thought-terminating cliché” by Robert Lifton – it’s a phrase that can be used to shut down deeper or more critical thinking on a given topic. Examples include, “Well, it’s in God’s hands” or “It is what it is” or “Everything happens for a reason.”
The book is very interesting and written in a friendly, casual tone, but I wish the author had taken the idea of research a little more seriously. She’s quoting experts and has a carefully collected set of endnotes, referring readers to her sources, which is great, but I wish she had been a bit more thorough. Rather than telling us about an article in Psychology Today, for example, it would give her work a bit more gravitas to cite the article writer’s academic papers. At one point, she tells us that the author Tara Isabella Burton wrote that religions provide us with meaning, purpose, a sense of community, and ritual, and I have no doubt that Burton did say such things in the book our author is citing – but presumably in that book Burton also explained that this list of what religions do actually originated with Emile Durkheim, the founder of sociology. Attributing the list to Burton rather than Durkheim makes the author seem naïve, overly rushed, or sloppy – it would have only taken her a moment to get the information from the Internet.
With those caveats, if you’re interested in quirky and sometimes dangerous ways that modern humans influence each other through our desires to feel connected, this book can be a good and often fun introduction.
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
This book WAS a bit all over the place for sure, it's casually written but I kind of like that as it makes it more approachable than a book meant to be a dissertation or thesis. Sometimes she does forget to follow-up on certain things she alludes to (I was definitely waiting for more about Stan culture and the psychological impacts of it but she basically just mentioned swifties once and then moved on). I definitely recommend listening to this one as the narrator is delightful and it makes it a day or twos worth of reading. It's not a deep dive for sure, and people who are SUPER into linguistics might be hungry for more serious works but I found it to be a good intro to the concept of "cultish" language, I didn't think I was into linguistic anthropology really but it MADE me interested in it. It also recommended a bunch of other works that I plan on looking into some time for deeper dives on certain pieces.