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| Dancing in the Streets: A History of Collective Joy | 
 enlarge | Author: Barbara Ehrenreich
Publisher: Granta Books
Category: Book
List Price: £16.99
Buy New: £7.99
You Save: £9.00 (53%)
New (31) Used (3) from £6.95
Avg. Customer Rating:  2 reviews
Sales Rank: 171820
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 240
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 9.2 x 6.3 x 1.3
ISBN: 1862079544
EAN: 9781862079540
Publication Date: April 2, 2007
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Condition: New copy, mint condition. Orders are despatched from our UK warehouse next working day.
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| Customer Reviews:
Joy versus depression in western culture May 16, 2008
This is an interesting take on the rise of misery in western culture - the thesis being that it has been the gradual suppression of all outlets to communal celebration that has led to xs individualism and great misery.
The descriptions of the changes in church culture and the place of organised religion as part of communal ecstacy is interesting as is the parallels with older pagan customs and modern night club culture.
A good read but the well researched but simple idea runs out of steam a bit at the end and depression has many more sociocultural roots than the lack of communal ecstacy - eg the breakdown of the family and the increasing divide between rich and poor
The importance of being ecstatic April 22, 2007
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
Dancing in the Streets is a manifesto for collective joy, or more specifically the open displays of public ecstasy which Ehrenreich claims spark and sustain it. At the same time she holds that we Europeans have been hostage to a sort of collective low spirits for three or four centuries. Hence this is simultaneoulsy both uplifting and a miserabilist tract. Bristling with footnotes and references to everyone from Jesus to Bunyan, (and taking in Robespierre and Bo Diddley en route), this is a book that pretends to academic seriousness. But it is redeemed by a bustle of intriguing and colourful historical details. Orgiastic gatherings in the Ancient World, the origin of the Mexican wave at Eighties' football matches - and the successful struggle of African slaves to keep ecstatic elements of their culture alive - are all here. Ultimately the thesis that a dearth of public revels lies at the roots of western societies ills may not convince many, but this is an engaging, enlightening book which carries you along despite yourself.
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