Hugh Mackay

The Way We Are

'How can I get in touch with this real self, underlying all my surface behaviour? How can I become myself?' Carl Rogers, US psychotherapistThe Inner Self is a book about the ways we hide from the truth about ourselves and the psychological freedom we enjoy when we finally face that most searching question of all: 'Who am I, really?'Hugh Mackay explores our 'top 20' hiding places - from addiction to materialism, nostalgia to victimhood. He explains how it is our fear of love's demands that drive us into hiding. He argues that love is our highest ideal, the richest source of life's meaning and purpose, and the key to our emotional security, personal serenity and confidence.Yet Mackay exposes the great paradox of human nature, that while love brings out our best, we don't always want our best brought forward.Powerfully written and drawing on a lifetime of research, The Inner Self is a work of extraordinary insight by one of Australia's most respected psychologists.

The Joy of Discovering Who We Really Are

The Inner Self

The eternal question 'Who am I?' must be weighed against an even deeper question: 'Who are we?' We are writing each other's stories as much as we are writing our own. In his bestselling book, The Good Life, Hugh Mackay argued that kindness and respect for others are the hallmarks of a life well lived. Now in The Art of Belonging Mackay shows how strong communities develop our moral sense and build our emotional security. He says that as 'social creatures' we can only reach our potential when we engage with our communities - in the local neighbourhood, at work and even online. Drawing on his lifelong work as a social researcher, Mackay creates a fictional suburb, Southwood, and populates it with characters who, like most of us, struggle to reconcile their need to belong with their desire to live life on their own terms. Through a series of stories, illuminated by Mackay's social analysis, we witness the conflicts that arise when individuals assert their needs at the expense of others, but we also glimpse the satisfactions that flow from contributing to the common good. Written with wisdom, compassion and wit, The Art of Belonging is for those who yearn for a society that sustains and nurtures the many, not just the fortunate few.

The Art of Belonging

In this updated edition with a new prologue on the seven characteristics that define us, Hugh Mackay explains us to ourselves and, in the process, helps us understand each other a little better. Ever wondered what 'human nature' really means? This new edition of What Makes Us Tick takes us beneath the often overwhelming surface noise of politics, economics, new technology and social change to explore something that hasn't changed: the ten desires that drive us all and, now in a new prologue, the seven characteristics that define us as a species. From our desire to be taken seriously, to be useful and to be loved, to the desire for more, the desire for control and the desire for something to believe in, these universal human motivations powerfully influence our behaviour towards each other. Hugh Mackay goes to the heart of what it means to be human. This is a book that explains us to ourselves and, in the process, helps us understand each other a little better. It also encourages us to lead more generous, compassionate lives.

The Ten Desires That Drive Us

What Makes Us Tick?

"No one can promise you that a life lived for others will bring you a deep sense of satisfaction, but it's certain that nothing else will."Hugh Mackay has spent his entire working life asking Australians about their values, motivations, ambitions, hopes and fears. Now, in The Good Life, he addresses the ultimate question: What makes a life worth living?His conclusion is provocative. The good life is not the sum of our security, wealth, status, postcode, career success and levels of happiness. The good life is one defined by our capacity for selflessness, the quality of our relationships and our willingness to connect with others in a useful way.Mackay examines what is known as the Golden Rule through the prisms of religion, philosophy, politics, business and family life. And he explores the numerous and often painful ways we distract ourselves from this central principle: our pursuit of pleasure, our attempts to perfect ourselves and our children, and our conviction that we can have our lives under control.Argued with all the passion and intelligence we have come to expect from one of Australia's most prolific and insightful authors, The Good Life is a book that will start conversations, ignite arguments and possibly even change the way we live our lives.

The Good Life

Generous, erudite, optimistic and candid...Hugh Mackay encourages us to find the best in ourselves and in our society in both good and troubled times.

How We Can Rebuild Trust, Restore Hope and Live with Generosity and Optimism

The Kindness Revolution

Paul du Gay

Stuart Hall

Keith Negus

Linda Janes

Anders Koed Madsen

What does the Walkman have to do with the 21st century? The long-awaited second edition of this classic textbook takes students on a journey to the past and back again, giving them to skills do to cultural analysis along the way. Through the 'circuit of culture', this book teaches students to critically examine what culture means, and how and why it is enmeshed with the media texts and objects in their lives. Students will: • gain practical experience with the historical comparative method • learn to think about some of the cultural conundrums of the present • unpack the key concepts of contemporary culture, such as mobility and materiality • look with fresh eyes at the media world and their practice within it • practice their critical skills with up-to-date exercises and activities. This book remains the perfect 'how to' for cultural studies. It is an essential classic, reworked for today's students in cultural studies, media studies and sociology.

The Story of the Sony Walkman

Doing Cultural Studies

Through a chance meeting at the Royal Academy, Tom Harper makes friends with Sarah Delacour. An esteemed scholar of children's rhymes, Sarah is beautiful, smart and charming. She is also the wife of a terminally ill millionaire, who keeps her close with the promise of a large inheritance. Tom falls deeply in love with the Sarah, and waits for her to reciprocate. But while Sarah is brilliant at playing the role of a woman in love, her ultimate commitment is to securing a life of wealth and comfort, and Tom finds he cannot compete with what she already has on offer. Compassionate, insightful and beautifully written, Infidelity is a story about how we lose ourselves when seeking a genuine connection from within the maelstrom of sexual passion.

A Novel

Infidelity

The Therapist, from bestselling author Hugh Mackay, is a powerful and poignant story of deception, ambiguity, lust and love - and the challenge of living with the consequences of our actions. 'I loved the chance to peek inside a therapist's office . . . told with such intelligence and tenderness.' Debra Oswald, bestselling author of The Family Doctor 'Smart, empathic and perfectly plotted - The Therapist is a marvellous read.' Jacqueline Maley, bestselling author of The Truth About Her A VIVID PORTRAYAL OF THE COMPLEXITIES OF CONTEMPORARY LIFE Martha Elliott, maverick psychotherapist, harbours some dark secrets from her own past, and is more interested in achieving good outcomes for her clients than playing by the rules. Martha blends counselling with breathing exercises, meditation, foot massages . . . whatever it takes. In a series of intense encounters with her clients, deep insights and raw truths about human nature emerge, including reflections on the nature of psychotherapy itself. Rob, Martha's colleague, is trapped in a tempestuous relationship with the beautiful and feisty Constancia, and Martha wonders if he will ever find the resolve to free himself. Samantha, Martha's daughter, hears her biological clock ticking, but finding the right sperm donor is proving to be harder than she expected . . . Then there's the mysterious couple who arrive in Martha's office. Who are they? And what is it that they know about her? With tenderness and compassion, Hugh Mackay's captivating new novel, The Therapist, explores some of the deepest yearnings of the human heart.

The Therapist

We often blame the ills of society on the media. But how much effect do the media actually have on our thinking and actions and can we blame them for everything that is wrong with modern society? Hugh Mackay addresses these questions in an examination of the influence of the media in our lives.

Why Our Fear of Modern Media is Misplaced

Media Mania

The hardest thing, finally, is to accept our insignificance in the scheme of things - or perhaps to accept that there is no 'scheme of things'. Tom Harper, a 43-year-old Australian psychologist, is in self-imposed exile in London, living down a sexual indiscretion with a client. Through a chance meeting at the Royal Academy, he makes friends with Sarah Delacour, an academic who studies nursery rhymes. Sarah is beautiful, charming and smart, but she is morally trapped - and perhaps corrupted - by decisions she has made in the past. As Tom and Sarah's relationship evolves, many layers of infidelity emerge. Tom falls deeply in love and waits for Sarah to reciprocate. But while Sarah is brilliant at playing the role of a woman in love, Tom fears her ultimate commitment may be to securing a life of luxury. Through his fiction and non-fiction, Hugh Mackay has developed a reputation as an acute and compassionate observer of the human condition, with all its shades of light and dark. In this beautifully written tale of love and the desire for control, he explores one of life's most troubling questions: do our circumstances justify or merely explain our behaviour?

'Hugh Mackay is one of this country?s most perceptive social commentators' - Sydney Morning Herald Insightful and engaging, What Makes Us Tick? helps to explain what drives us, concerns us and is important to each of us ? from Australia's leading social researcher, Hugh Mackay. Dr Mackay has spent a lifetime listening to people talk about their dreams, fears, hopes, disappointments and passions. As well, his bestselling books have documented the impact of the changes that have been radically reshaping our society. In What Makes Us Tick? he reflects on some of the things that don't change, identifies ten desires that drive us all, and asks: 'Why do we talk as if we're rational, but act as if we're not?'; 'Why do some people always want to take control?'; 'Why do we seek change, yet resist it?'; 'Why do we want more of the things that have failed to satisfy us?'. His exploration of these and other issues goes to the heart of some of life's big questions. In this new edition Hugh Mackay offers a postscript that delves into the many concerns that were raised by people around the country when he was first promoting What Makes Us Tick?. They include: 'Why do people become workaholics?'; 'How can religious people hold such irrational beliefs?'; 'Why are so many people hooked on social media?'; 'What about gender and generational differences?'; 'Shouldn't our desire for security be on the list?', as well as many other issues that resonate with modern Australia. He also offers more thoughts on ? the desire to be taken seriously; the desire for 'my place'; the desire for something to believe in; the desire to connect; the desire to be useful. Raising all these ideas, this is a book that will explain us to ourselves. Hugh Mackay is a psychologist, social researcher and novelist, and is the author of the the bestselling Advance Australia... Where?

John Beynon

This collection of papers (plus some other material), presented at the Symposium on Information Technology and Education, BERA conference, in 1988, aims to provide a picture of current information technology and education research issues and debates. The style is non-technical and accessible.

Computers Into Classrooms

In modern Western societies we are presented with a hugh array of choices and encouraged to believe that having the freedom to choose sets us on the path to happiness. Yet, as renowned social commentator Hugh Mackay shows in Right & Wrong: how to decide for yourself, freedom to choose is no freedom at all unless it is accompanied by the confiden...

How to Decide for Yourself

Right and Wrong

Generous, erudite, optimistic and candid...Hugh Mackay encourages us to find the best in ourselves and in our society in both good and troubled times. Revolutions never start at the top. If we dare to dream of a more loving country - kinder, more compassionate, more cooperative, more respectful, more inclusive, more egalitarian, more harmonious, less cynical - there's only one way to start turning that dream into a reality: each of us must live as if this is already that country. Following the ravages of 2020's bushfires and pandemic on our mental and emotional health and on the economy, Hugh Mackay reflects on the challenges we faced during that year of upheaval and the questions many of us have asked. What really matters to me? Am I living the kind of life I want? What sort of society do I want us to become? Urging us not to let those questions go, and pointing to our inspiring displays of kindness and consideration, our personal sacrifices for the common good and our heightened appreciation of the value of local neighbourhoods and communities, he asks in turn: 'Could we become renowned as a loving country, rather than simply a "lucky" one?' Absorbing, wise and inspiring, The Kindness Revolution is a distillation of Hugh Mackay's life's work. Written for our times, this truly remarkable book shows how crises and catastrophes often turn out to be the making of us.

How we can restore hope, rebuild trust and inspire optimism

What do people actually mean when they say 'God'?Around two-thirds of us say we believe in God or some 'higher power', but fewer than one in ten Australians attend church weekly. In Beyond Belief, Hugh Mackay presents this discrepancy as one of the great unexamined topics of our time. He argues that while our attachment to a traditional idea of God may be waning, our desire for a life of meaning remains as strong as ever. Mackay interviews dozens of Australians representing many different points on the spectrum of faith, including some who are part of the emerging 'spiritual but not religious' movement. He exposes the deep vein of ambivalence about religion that runs through our society: we may not actively worship, but we still like to see local churches operating in our midst, and we use 'our' church to marry, christen our babies, educate our children and commemorate our dead. He points out some uncomfortable truths, such as our tendency to call on God only in a crisis, and unpacks our human need for 'answers', even when science can't find them. He endorses the Christian ideal of the good life - a life lived for others - but acknowledges that there are many pathways to that same goal, not all of them religious. Written with all the insight and compassion we have come to expect of our leading chronicler of Australian life, Beyond Belief is an engrossing exploration of the ways we find spiritual fulfilment in an avowedly secular age.

Beyond Belief

Tim O'Sullivan

`Alertness to the changing terms of debate, familiarity with the latest scholarship and a shrewd, practical sense of what works in teaching make this collection a very worthwhile addition to course reading lists' - John Corner, University of Liverpool The Media Reader is an essential sourcebook of key statements about transformations in media culture. The Reader explores the technological, economic, social and cultural processes implicated in the production, regulation, circulation and consumption of media forms. It applies theoretical approaches, supported by a range of case studies, to past and present media transformations. Divided into four parts: Mass Communications and the Modern World;

Hugh Mackay

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