{"id":800,"date":"2009-10-04T16:48:00","date_gmt":"2009-10-04T16:48:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/2009\/10\/04\/800\/"},"modified":"2010-05-03T19:58:48","modified_gmt":"2010-05-04T00:58:48","slug":"800","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/?p=800","title":{"rendered":"Anomie"},"content":{"rendered":"

Are we living in a time of “anomie”<\/span>? Sociologist Emile Durkheim defined anomie<\/a> as the time between the breakdown of one social order and the establishment of a new one. During times of anomie, people are often confused, as they lack clear rules on how to live and relate with each other. <\/p>\n

I think that we are in such a time. I believe that until the 1970s there was a dominant social order in America built around the suburbs, the manufacturing economy, and advancing science and technology. Although we still have suburbs and advancing science and technology (the manufacturing economy was DOA by the mid 1980s), we aren’t quite as enthused about them as we once were; we are no longer willing to build a social narrative around them. <\/p>\n

The modernist suburban-industrial social order started breaking down in the mid 1960s with the urban riots and college unrest over Vietnam. It was prevented from healing by the oil shortages and economic strife of the 1970s and early 80s (not to mention Richard Nixon). Then came the Internet, and 9-11, and zing, we’re not in Tullytown anymore. “My Three Sons” and “Ozzie and Harriet” are dead and gone, and there’s a bit too much deviant crime (mother drowns newborn infant, stoned parent with 3 kids in car crashes into opposing traffic, gang beats teen to death on video, etc.). And a bit too much prurient interest in it. <\/p>\n

Michael Jackson is also dead and gone, but the whole spectacle surrounding it just proves my point.<\/p>\n

I think that our society and culture is presently in a conflict mode between two poles; one based on internationalism, ethnic diversity, educational achievement (not necessarily true education<\/u>), and the embrace of user-friendly communications\/entertainment technology; the other is based around more traditional values such as religion, family, small community, and individual triumph in gladiator-like arenas (e.g., NASCAR racing). Yes, the opposing icons are Barack Obama and Sarah Palin (hopefully she will eventually go away and allow Mike Huckabee to take the “red state” mantle). We’re not sure just which one defines the accepted cultural norm; it keeps on flipping. Perhaps half of the population represent “true believers”, committed to one lifestyle or the other; the other half drift around in a state of anomie. <\/p>\n

Recently I found a picture that I took by accident, pressing the shudder unintentionally. I was going to ditch it, but something about it seemed interesting. It looked a bit like modern art. So I put it through some Photoshop hocus-pocus, and here’s what I got. I call it, “Art for a Time of Anomie”. Somewhat facetiously, of course. But here it is, nonetheless.<\/p>\n

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Are we living in a time of “anomie”? Sociologist Emile Durkheim defined anomie as the time between the breakdown of one social order and the establishment of a new one. During times of anomie, people are often confused, as they lack clear rules on how to live and relate with each other. I think that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,23],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=800"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1464,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800\/revisions\/1464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}