Arthur G. Neal

Discussion Questions -- 11. The Terrorist Attack of September 11 -- Shattered Assumptions -- Causal Explanations -- The War on Terrorism -- Homeland Security -- The Culture of Fear -- Discussion Questions -- III. Epilogue -- 12. Collective Memory -- Generational Effects -- Commemoration -- Popular Culture and Mass Entertainment -- Links Between the Past and the Future -- Discussion Questions -- Bibliography -- Index -- About the Author

Extraordinary Events in the American Experience

National Trauma and Collective Memory

Violence in Animal and Human Societies

Ray Broadus Browne

Arthur B. Neal

The essays in this collection present communities beset by unexpected social and physical events. Some outline immediate responses that soon pass and some that will not go away. Who would have foreseen that Elvis would be a phenomenon apparently as lasting as the faces on Mount Rushmore? Cultural history will not allow us to forget the H. G. Wells account of the Martian attack, nor can we ever forget the continued terror of the Chernobyl explosion. Ordinary Reactions to Extraordinary Events catalogues on the Geiger counter of human emotions societal reactions to events both earthshaking and culture-disturbing.

Ordinary Reactions to Extraordinary Events

Helen Youngelson-Neal

According to sociologist C. Wright Mills, we do not live in a world of solid fact but in a world permeated by culture, constructed by humans through communication with each other. Myth-making shapes our lives, beliefs and behavior. Collective myths become plausible explanations for events past and future as each new generation constructs reality anew to make sense of the human condition. Providing a sociological and multicultural analysis, this book examines myth-making in the today’s world amid religious extremism and terrorism. The authors discuss the imperative of myth in comprehending illness, sexuality, death and human relationships to the environment and other animals.

Myth-Making and Religious Extremism and Their Roots in Crises

A fascinating exploration of our evolving national psyche, this book chronicles major traumas in recent American history - from the Depression and Pearl Harbor, to the assassinations of the Kennedys and Martin Luther King, Jr., to Ruby Ridge, Waco, and Columbine - how we responded to them as a nation, and what our responses mean. Reflecting on American popular culture as well as the media, this edition includes a new chapter on 9/11 and other acts of terror within the United States, as well as coverage of the Columbia space shuttle disaster. New student-friendly features, including discussion questions and "Symbolic Events" boxes in each chapter, give the book added value as a classroom supplement.

Arthur G. Neal

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