The Social Animal; The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement
David Burnett (author photograph) and Felix Sockwe New York: Random House, 2011. Second printing [stated]. Hardcover. xviii, 424, [6] pages. Notes. Index. Decorative DJ. Signed by author sticker on front of the DJ. Signed by the author on the title page. David Brooks (born August 11, 1961) is an American moderate conservative political and cultural commentator who writes for The New York Times. He has worked as a film critic for The Washington Times, a reporter and later op-ed editor for The Wall Street Journal, a senior editor at The Weekly Standard from its inception, a contributing editor at Newsweek, and The Atlantic Monthly, in addition to working as a commentator on NPR and the PBS NewsHour. The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character and Achievement was excerpted in The New Yorker in January 2011 and achieved its full publication in March of that year. It reached #3 on the Publishers Weekly bestsellers list for nonfiction in April 2011. In 2004 Brooks created an award to honor the best political and cultural journalism of the year. Named for philosopher Sidney Hook and originally called "The Hookies", the honor was renamed "The Sidney Awards" in 2005. The awards are presented each December. With unequaled insight and brio, David Brooks, the New York Times columnist and bestselling author of Bobos in Paradise, has long explored and explained the way we live. Now, with the intellectual curiosity and emotional wisdom that make his columns among the most read in the nation, Brooks turns to the building blocks of human flourishing in a multilayered, profoundly illuminating work grounded in everyday life. This is the story of how success happens. It is told through the lives of one composite American couple, Harold and Erica, how they grow, push forward, are pulled back, fail, and succeed. Distilling a vast array of information into these two vividly realized characters, Brooks illustrates a fundamental new understanding of human nature. A scientific revolution has occurred, we have learned more about the human brain in the last thirty years than we had in the previous three thousand. The unconscious mind, it turns out, is most of the mind, not a dark, vestigial place but a creative and enchanted one, where most of the brain's work gets done. This is the realm of emotions, intuitions, biases, longings, genetic predispositions, personality traits, and social norms: the realm where character is formed and where our most important life decisions are made. The natural habitat of The Social Animal. Drawing on a wealth of current research from numerous disciplines, Brooks takes Harold and Erica from infancy to school; from the odyssey years that have come to define young adulthood to the high walls of poverty; from the nature of attachment, love, and commitment, to the nature of effective leadership. He reveals the deeply social aspect of our very minds and exposes the bias in modern culture that overemphasizes rationalism, individualism, and IQ. Along the way, he demolishes conventional definitions of success while looking toward a culture based on trust and humility. The Social Animal is a moving and nuanced intellectual adventure, a story of achievement and a defense of progress. Impossible to put down, it is an essential book for our time, one that will have broad social impact and will change the way we see ourselves and the world. The Social Animal discusses what drives individual behavior and decision making. Brooks goes through various academic topics such as sociology, psychology, and biology and attempts to summarize various discoveries— such as brain development in early life. The book debuted at No. 1 on the New York Times bestseller list. The book has received a variety of positive reviews. Praise came from The Washington Times, Newsweek, and Kirkus Reviews. The book is a favorite of the former British Prime Minister and Conservative Party leader, David Cameron. Condition: Very good / Very good.
Keywords: Decision Making, Attachment, Learning, Norms, Self-Control, Culture, Intelligence, Freedom, Commitment, Limerence, Metis, Intelligence, Aging, Morality, Leadership. Education, Meaning
ISBN: 9781400067602
[Book #87034]
Price: $135.00