Haven in a Heartless World

by Lasch, Christopher

• ISBN13: 9780393313031
• ISBN10: 0393313034
• Edition: 00
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1995-05-17
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

One of the earliest and sharpest cultural commentators to investigate the twentieth-century American family, Christopher Lasch argues in this book that as social science "experts" intrude more and more into our lives, the family's vital role as the moral and social cornerstone of society disintegrates'”and, left unchecked, so does our political and personal freedom. Mr. Lasch combines an analytic overview of the psychological and sociological literature on the American family with his own trenchant analysis of where the problem lies.

Table of Contents

Preface to the Paperback Edition
Introduction
Social Pathologists and the Socialization of Reproduction	p. 3
Sociological Study of the Family in the Twenties and Thirties: "From Institution to Companionship"	p. 22
Roads Not Taken: Challenges to Sociological Orthodoxy	p. 44
Culture and Personality	p. 62
Doctors to a Sick Society	p. 97
The Social Theory of the Therapeutic: Parsons and the Parsonians	p. 111
The Attack on the Nuclear Family and the Search for "Alternate Life-Styles"	p. 134
Authority and the Family: Law and Order in a Permissive Society	p. 167
Notes	p. 191
Index	p. 223
Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.