The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a Multicultural Society

Please note: I'm not giving a negative review on the basis of the thesis of the argument. I'm giving a negative review because of how bafflingly self-refuting the author's arguments were.Reading this book, I held no real opinions on the matter. I was, to the best of my knowledge, impartial to the thesis being made. What I found bizarre was how inconsistent, arbitrary, and unfounded much of his arguments were.I'll just begin with the examples;The most glaring self-contradiction is when he quoted an argument in favor of recognizing Shakespeare, the Bible, and Huckleberry Finn as part of the US canon . . . and one page later, he argues that the US canon is an evolving and diverse canon and that new books will replace old ones.Within the context of the argument, he was trying to dismiss arguments that any other culture should have their books as part of the US canon besides the aforementioned books, and that they had no significant impact in Western culture . . . but then lists noteworthy philosophers who expressed viewpoints that they themselves claimed were influenced by reading Hindu and Buddhist schools of thought from translations during the 1800s. Nietzsche, in particular, studied philology and based a lot of his views from assessing the pros and cons of Buddhism which he labeled as superior to Christianity and it's known that the 1800s philology departments of Germany were translating and studying Indian languages and comparing them to Western languages to translate books from the East. The most baffling part of this is that he quoted several of the founders who claimed their connection to Western culture is dead and that the US culture will be distinct and separate from Western schools of thought as an argument in favor for a unique US culture, but seemed to confuse himself on what that meant since he's then making arguments in contradiction to the founders intentions by arguing the US is a western culture.What's peculiar is that this author claims that US culture is heterogeneous but that any other culture that adapts to foreign influenced, especially Eastern culture making adaptions, is really just imitating the Western influences and shouldn't reflect positively on those cultures. So, evidently, when the US is suppose to be heterogeneous and adaptable to other cultures, but shouldn't adapt Eastern culture. And, if Eastern culture adapts and enjoys Western schools of thought, then it proves their inferior? Keep in mind, this man claims to be a historian but seems to be utterly ignorant of the systematic removal of "heathen" ideas of the East throughout several cultural campaigns in the West.He claims ethnic studies should be taught . . . but then claims that ethnic studies aren't needed except for Native Americans, because kids get their cultural background understandings from their families and he doesn't seem to consider the timeframe of how long these families toil at work or have the chance to make a living. He celebrates West African children not knowing their cultural heritage or understanding their families native languages as proof of being more oriented towards US culture, but seems to ignore the fact this badly damages his previous argument that people maintain their cultural backgrounds from their families.He claims Black Americans are the most inculcated in US culture because of the dislocation from native Africa, the destruction of their previous heritages, and the force fed adaption to whatever culture the White slave-owners forced upon them. He clearly states that Black Americans could be regarded as the most American. Then, he decries the horrors of teaching this false history in New York schools. The problem is though, having grown-up in New York State, I can freely say that he's wrong about all this racial overemphasis without regard for history. The only international class we had was focused on European history exclusively. We never learned anything about Africa besides their relation to the slave trade with Europe.His arguments about this anti-intellectual falsehood of Black history supposedly began in 1987 . . . but if that's the case, then I never once experienced it in the early 2000s. Looking back at it, all the author really did was cherrypick stupid quotes to make sweeping generalizations. It is genuinely untrue that any of this farce that he talks about ever happened in NY State high schools. All I learned was European history and that was it. He made such a big deal out of this, quoting stupid comments over and over, and none of it had any truth to it or any impact on the educational system. What I found particularly disgusting was that he's unwilling to condemn or recognize human genocides of multiple ethnic groups who want their trials and tribulations recognized in history books, but there is a strong rejection of this in favor of a stupid set of half-truths and outright falsehoods being taught in the education system today about US history. Half of the work is basically telling kids they're wrong about what the education system taught them in first grade. It's pathetic.The last portion made me raise an eyebrow. He argues that the Left has gone too far with ethnic issues . . . and then makes a total non-sequitur argument using ableism as an example of the Left taking social justice too far. Ableism is the discrimination against people with handicap issues in jobs, school facilities, shopping centers, and tourism. I honestly began shaking my head over the callous disregard for the plight of handicap people and wondered why he would list this as a trite and worthless issue. Disabled people, especially children, most assuredly need to have areas that help assist with their disabilities.Overall, the thesis is unsubstantiated, and I honestly have no idea how someone could write a book that contradicted itself with no ability to make discernible or meaningful points on what they're arguing or what the end product of his ideas would even look like.

The Disuniting of America:I have just read the 1998 edition. Mr. Schlesinger has written a serious, nuanced set of essays about our multicultural society. Although the book is greater than the sum of related of essays: they were not published separately. The common theme is expressed in the Forward: "The more people feel themselves adrift ... the more they crave a politics of identity."Mr. Schlesinger is no enemy of multiple cultures. In 1947, Schlesinger, together with former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, Minneapolis mayor and future Senator and Vice President Hubert Humphrey, economist and longtime friend John Kenneth Galbraith, and Protestant theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, founded Americans for Democratic Action. He favors diversity, which may confuse some readers, as his thesis is not to eliminate it, but to be wary of its stridency.He favors a single America, "governed together ... instilled by shared history, values, and language." The book is punctuated with stories and writings of 19th and 20th Century writers. (One of the more interesting features of the book is the Appendix, in which Mr. Schlesinger lists and summarizes a (baker's) dozen works that epitomize America, from "The Federalist," "Democracy in America," to "Uncle Tom's Cabin," and Henry Adams "Education," among others. He cannot abide the erasure of history. "For better or for worse, American history has been shaped more than anything else by British tradition and culture. To deny this perhaps lamentable but hardly disputable fact would be to falsify history." "The purpose of history is to promote not group self-esteem, but understanding of the world." He would not favor the destruction of monuments, now so prevalent, as it is in and has been recently in Iraq.Mr. Schlesinger traces much of the enthusiasm for multicultural extremism to the academic world, who, on the whole, define what we are taught and how -- and beyond. "The University of Pennsylvania gives blacks - 6 percent of the enrollment - their own yearbook." (His quote from Reinhold Niebuhr is resonant: "The chief source of man's inhumanity to man seems to be the tribal limits of his sense of obligation to other men." Today, many would dismiss this statement because it uses only the male personal pronoun, as tribalism has grown steadily worse since the author wrote it.) Ironically, the assault on our history is being led by the "analytical weapons" developed in the West."This book is easy to read and thought-provoking. It is a prophecy of worse to come. It was written over twenty years ago. It has come.

Given the current development in the so called First World - this should be made mandatory lecture.

very good book would recommend and came on time

This is a brilliant essay on multiculturalism. Schlesinger points out that "a common language is a necessary bond of national cohesion." So we should do everything possible to ensure that those who live here in Britain can speak English.We need to have a common culture, in our single society, of one nation. We should defend British working class culture, which is the positive aspect of our country's history, while rejecting the bourgeoisie's imperial, reactionary culture. Schlesinger writes, "Belief in one's own culture does not require disdain for other cultures." This is like self-respect - respecting oneself does not mean disrespect for other people.

The title says it all. Writing about the perils of identity politics, Schlesinger is optimistic: surely Americans will not allow the manifest irrationalities of identity politics to balkanize America. Surely multiculturalism and political correctness are no threat to American democracy. But he tried to warn us anyway; his unease repeats on every page. I wish I could share his optimism. But since 1999, when this book was published, the new tribalism has infected American politics to the point where it doesn't take much imagination to see the country breaking apart. I hope I am wrong. The world needs a healthy United States, and I say this as a near outsider (that's a joke, son). As a Canadian, and an obsessive student of American history, I see the same forces emerging in my country, though I don't believe that matters have gone quite as far up here. There is small comfort in that, however. Canadians have frequently observed that what happens in the United States happens here ten years later. Besides, if you want my opinion (call out if you don't), identity politics are what you get when fascism learns decent table manners and how to dress well. Highly recommended.

Centra in maniera precisa e convincente un'America, ma si può facilmente includere anche l'Europa, in cui una sinistra che non ha più la missione di difendere i lavoratori dai soprusi dei datori di lavoro, si trova a corto di idee e di ideali.Ecco quindi che, in assenza di vittime (lavoratori) da difendere, ne cerca, anzi ne crea altre: le minoranze etniche, le minoranze con tendenze sessuali non tradizionali, persino le donne in genere eccetera. Tutte queste categorie di "vittime" sarebbero perseguitate da una maggioranza di l maschi bianchi benestanti e contro questa maggioranza vanno protette. Ne deriva l'esigenza di un astruso linguaggio politically correct per non offendere le minoranze vittimizzate. Ne deriva il tentativo di riscrivere la storia, anche senza rispettare la verità dei fatti, pur di dare alle minoranze qualcosa di cui essere fieri. E tante altre conseguenze deleterie per la società americana, fra cui prima di tutte, la più deleteria, è la divisione della popolazione in gruppi conflittuali.