In the previous essay I hoped to make clear the connection between the phenomenon of cultural existentialism with that of its formal counterpart–the philosophy of Existentialism. Again, I believe the connection between them is one of similarity rather than direct causality, and that the primary difference between the two is merely the extent to which they are articulated. Still, the average person is not a philosopher–let alone Sartre–so in many ways the accusation that cultural existentialism is widely embodied but not articulated is unfair. For a more common view of cultural existentialism, I would like to turn to the excellent work of the sociologist Robert Bellah, and some of his colleagues, such as Richard Madsen, William M. Sullivan, Ann Swindler, and Steven M. Tipton.1 Much of their research, findings, and collaboration on American culture from the early 1980s will help color the outline I have sketched thus far.
Continue reading “Cultural Existentialism: The Absurdity of American Individualism”Category: Alexis de Tocqueville
Achievement Culture: Some Considerations In Context
Over the course of three previous essays, I sketched some of the origins of what I have called “the modern culture of achievement”.1 What has been missing up to this point in these explorations is a historical understanding of the context in which these origins emerged. The origins of modern success literature (and its corresponding culture) came about at a time when the quest to succeed existed in an almost exclusively–though not entirely–secular way. As Max Weber observed, the “spirit of capitalism” reached a point where it became self-sufficient, no longer requiring the religious impetus which had sparked it.2 It was in the rational and methodical reorganization of life, structured around the idea of a vocation or calling, which laid the groundwork for what I have described in the origin story.3 This is what I had in mind, when, speaking of success literature in Part I, I wrote, “the literature in question developed and emerged within a culture that already existed”. It is within the context of the larger whole of socioeconomic history that a deeper and broader understanding of the origins of achievement culture will emerge.4
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