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Therapy Culture: Cultivating Vulnerability in an Uncertain Age (Paperback)

by Frank Furedi (Author) "Trying to make sense of the problems that confront us in a complex modern society is a challenge fraught with difficulty ..." (more)
4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
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Product details

  • Paperback: 256 pages
  • Publisher: Routledge; 1 edition (13 Oct 2003)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 041532159X
  • ISBN-13: 978-0415321594
  • Product Dimensions: 23 x 15.6 x 2 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 223,169 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #55 in  Books > Health, Family & Lifestyle > Psychology & Psychiatry > History & Philosophy > Philosophy

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  • See Complete Table of Contents

Product Description

The Times

This is what our life is all about. Instead of seeking a treatment for it, we should try living it. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Review

'Therapy is indeed the new opium of the people, as Frank Furedi makes clear in this fascinating, readable - and disturbing - book.' - Virginia Ironside, The Independent

'Can it really be such a bad thing that we are now more aware of the place of mental health in our make-up? Furedi leaves us in no doubt that the therapy culture has invaded our media, our workplace, our intimate relationships and our politics. It is an interesting polemic. We should be grateful for the balance this book inspires'
- Community Care 25/4/04

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Inside This Book (Learn More)
First Sentence
Trying to make sense of the problems that confront us in a complex modern society is a challenge fraught with difficulty. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index
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54 of 59 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Society should get off the therapist's couch, 23 Oct 2003
By Jon Holbrook (London United Kingdom) - See all my reviews
With the title 'Therapy Culture' and the cover picture of a therapist's couch it is not immediately obvious why this book should be of interest to anyone outside the world of counselling. But titles and cover pages can be deceptive. Furedi observes that the notion of 'therapy' no longer refers to unusual problems or exotic states of mind. Everyday experiences are today readily given a psychological label like generalised anxiety disorder (being worried), social anxiety disorder (being shy), social phobia (being really shy), or free-floating anxiety (not knowing what you are worried about). Furedi shows that many everyday experiences are today medicalised and posed as a direct threat to one's emotional well-being. So therapy is not just about lying on the therapist's couch, it has become a way in which society expects individuals to understand and cope with life.

As a lawyer I was particularly interested in the chapter on therapeutic claim-making. Furedi argues that instead of looking to friends and informal networks for affirmation people nowadays tend to seek formal recognition by, for example, suing. Society's recognition of a variety of emotional injuries, such as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, or other hitherto unknown conditions has enabled people to seek formal recognition for a variety of issues. As one claimant in a sex discrimination case put it 'I knew that I had been the victim, but I needed others to know it'.

The strength of Furedi's book is that he not only describes the growth and prevalence of a therapeutic culture in Anglo-American societies but he explains why it matters. The therapeutic approach, argues Furedi, becomes a means through which individuals are not so much cured as placed in a state of recovery. They are far more likely to be instructed to acknowledge their problems than to transcend them. At a social level the therapeutic culture teaches us to be victims and to know our place especially before an 'expert' whether he be a therapist, doctor, lawyer or general do-good community professional. This is an excellent and powerful book for those who seek genuine personal and social enlightenment.

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38 of 42 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars A rational study of the emotionalism of our times, 17 Oct 2003
Frank Furedi's latest book is a highly readable and compelling study into the rise of 'therapy culture' in contemporary society. For anyone who is disturbed by the excessive emotionalism of politics, public life and culture, this well-argued book provides a welcome antidote. Furedi conducts an alarming survey of the extent to which counselling and therapeutic policies have spread into different areas of our private and public life. His conclusion, however, is not an attack against therapy per se, but rather, the culture of therapy which elevates particular emotions, the notion of 'self-esteem' and a highly individuated sense of fulfilment. The strength of the book is not to just describe this trend but to highlight its most corrosive aspects, particularly how the culture of therapy nurtures a culture of dependence, where people are increasingly encouraged to seek professional advice from 'experts'. Ironically, the professionalisation of emotion management does not make us more at ease with our feelings but rather more suspicious and undermines the existing intimate relations we do have. Highly recommended to anyone interested in contemporary social trends and culture.
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Could be more hard-hitting, 9 Jun 2008
By Ms. L. R. Fisher "lucy_fisher4" (London) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
But keep hitting, Frank. "Therapy is a business", and an expanding business needs more and more consumers. So why not recast all of life's problems as disorders or syndromes or phobias and send everybody off for counselling? Remember that island where the inhabitants lived by taking in each other's washing? He assumes, though, that counsellors give counsel. They don't, they just listen (which could be what's needed). Advice is in short supply. Furedi is good on the way social problems have been redefined as individual problems - could this be to stop anybody banding together to try and cure their social problems? Social problems are redefined - or rather, maddeningly undefined - as Social Exclusion (this used to be called "deprivation"). Arts organisations are forced to tick boxes about inclusiveness in order to get their funding and this loathsome social worker speak spreads throughout the land. This book is full of typos and repetition, and would benefit from being broken up with headings and bullet points. And why not a few cartoons?
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

2.0 out of 5 stars anti-therapy polemic fails to convince
Furedi certainly seems to have it in, for our 'touchy-feely' therapeutic culture, and makes a number of telling criticisms. Read more
Published on 25 May 2004 by R. J. Tattersall

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