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550 reviews for:
Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right
Arlie Russell Hochschild
4.09 AVERAGE
550 reviews for:
Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right
Arlie Russell Hochschild
4.09 AVERAGE
gave up at “the (political) split has widened because the right has moved right, not because the left has moved left”
give me a break.
read this if you’re a self described liberal who wants to give yourself a couple of pats on the back for being so much more enlightened than the peasants (that comprise half our country). if you’re capable of nuanced thoughts about why people can hold different opinions, i’d venture to say you don’t need this.
hard pass
give me a break.
read this if you’re a self described liberal who wants to give yourself a couple of pats on the back for being so much more enlightened than the peasants (that comprise half our country). if you’re capable of nuanced thoughts about why people can hold different opinions, i’d venture to say you don’t need this.
hard pass
I guess I must not be in as much of a liberal bubble as the author--this material didn't provide me with any insights on why people seem to vote against their own interest. I also didn't feel the author came away with any insights herself, other than "conservative voters are people too...who knew?" My job takes me all over the red part of the country, to work with very bright, successful and mainly conservative people. It's a gross oversimplification to characterize them all as one-issue voters or as brainwashed Fox News zombies, and I think at the heart of this book that's still the author's conclusion, wrapped in empathetic rhetoric though it may be. My votes lean very liberal and progressive, but I guess my lifestyle puts me in the wrong audience for this book, because I didn't get much out of it. I think it doesn't do much to break down polarizing stereotypes, which was what I was hoping for.
This book is primarily an effort to tell the stories of a handful of Louisianans that the author met, interviewed, and in many cases, befriended. It does very well in telling those stories. The book also has a theory to tie together the common elements of how this group saw the world, a "deep story" in the author's words. There are a number of elements to the deep story, but the most prominent is the representation of prosperity as a line, and the resentments that some feel due to line-jumping (whether real or perceived - perception is reality). The theories that ties these stories together (much deeper than my one sentence description) fit the stories really well, and are the best part of the book.
What didn't I like? Two things:
1. The author seems to be writing for an assumed audience of liberals, thus takes some liberties that while might make the writing easier, they also might turn off some readers.
2. For the first 2/3rds of the book, the common thread is environmental activism. That wasn't in any of the material that got me interested in the book. It isn't in the description on this Goodreads page, or just barely. It isn't how people are talking about the book. I found myself having to wade through a lot of material on the environment to get to the part I'd been promised in the later part of the book. The environment gets discussed at length in most or all of the interviews chronicled in the book. I think people should know that up front.
What didn't I like? Two things:
1. The author seems to be writing for an assumed audience of liberals, thus takes some liberties that while might make the writing easier, they also might turn off some readers.
2. For the first 2/3rds of the book, the common thread is environmental activism. That wasn't in any of the material that got me interested in the book. It isn't in the description on this Goodreads page, or just barely. It isn't how people are talking about the book. I found myself having to wade through a lot of material on the environment to get to the part I'd been promised in the later part of the book. The environment gets discussed at length in most or all of the interviews chronicled in the book. I think people should know that up front.
I had heard a lot about this book, and how it revealed insights into the current political divide, but I found it a little dissatisfying. It’s a sociological tome, and comes off a little condescending of its subjects (conservatives in Louisiana), despite setting out to be just the opposite. She looks at the divide through the lens of environmental issues, but I think this is too narrow, and doesn’t really get at bigger issues like racism and religion. It’s all also so disheartening. She builds up this metaphor to describe the point of view of her subjects, and you can see how easy it is for them to be taken in by lies of those on the Right, and how hard it will be to dislodge them.
informative
reflective
medium-paced
Extremely enlightening. I will strive to see over the empathy wall. I deeply appreciate a glimpse into the hearts and minds of those who’s votes are incomprehensible to me.
Hochschild's goal is to build empathy between the liberal and tea party voters in the country. While her exploration of these people in rural Louisiana is eye-opening and gripping, I'm not sure one can ever empathize with people who knowingly vote against their best interests (using religion as their sole defense) when their land and lives are constantly at the mercy of oil companies and rampant pollution.
I decided to read this book post-presidential election, hoping to gain understanding of why Tea Partiers and far-right Republicans would vote for the fascist Donald J. Trump.
The book is very well-written and the thorough research Hochschild conducts is admirable. Though liberal herself, she is very unbiased during her discussions and mostly serves to relay the subjects' stories.
That being said, the first half of this book did little to garner within me the empathy I was hoping to and really just pissed me off. It reinforced all of the assumptions I have made about people who vote Republican.
Finally, during the third and fourth parts of the text did I finally start seeing the other side. I was still frustrated, however, because so much of the opinions people have are steeped in fiction. Hochschild does a great job fact-checking the opinions she encounters and giving the correct information in the endnotes for readers. I am left wondering if she ever relayed these facts to her "Tea Party friends," as she calls them. Perhaps that was never the point; her goal was to listen, not educate.
All in all, my greatest takeaway from this book was taking a good, hard look in the mirror. Name calling and waiting-for-your-turn-to-talk listening will never bridge the wide divide that is currently happening in our country. I want to listen, really listen, to people who feel forgotten, because, I think, we all feel that way. The "American Dream" doesn't look the way it used to, and it's not even the same for everyone, but that's okay. At the end of the day, we all just want to love and be loved; so we aren't really all that different. We just need to be willing to listen.
The book is very well-written and the thorough research Hochschild conducts is admirable. Though liberal herself, she is very unbiased during her discussions and mostly serves to relay the subjects' stories.
That being said, the first half of this book did little to garner within me the empathy I was hoping to and really just pissed me off. It reinforced all of the assumptions I have made about people who vote Republican.
Finally, during the third and fourth parts of the text did I finally start seeing the other side. I was still frustrated, however, because so much of the opinions people have are steeped in fiction. Hochschild does a great job fact-checking the opinions she encounters and giving the correct information in the endnotes for readers. I am left wondering if she ever relayed these facts to her "Tea Party friends," as she calls them. Perhaps that was never the point; her goal was to listen, not educate.
All in all, my greatest takeaway from this book was taking a good, hard look in the mirror. Name calling and waiting-for-your-turn-to-talk listening will never bridge the wide divide that is currently happening in our country. I want to listen, really listen, to people who feel forgotten, because, I think, we all feel that way. The "American Dream" doesn't look the way it used to, and it's not even the same for everyone, but that's okay. At the end of the day, we all just want to love and be loved; so we aren't really all that different. We just need to be willing to listen.
I still have so many questions about the far-right and the tea party BUT I learned so much about how those who see things different politically approach these issues that concern us both. That being said, there were many times where I just couldn't help but be frustrated with many of those spotlighted being okay with the idea of chemical dumping and the belief that companies truly will regulate themselves. One person said, "environmental pollution is the price we pay for capitalism" - and this makes me want to become more of an environmentalist in all things.
Pretty much what I thought. But, I still don’t understand how people whose lives are being devastated by industry, deregulation, and pollution continue to support the very people and institutions that are destroying their lives. The back of the book contains facts and figures that debunk the arguments or “deep story” the communities believe to be true.