April 10, 2010
BOOK REVIEW: 'The Cracked Bell': A Brit Pulls a Tocqueville in the Wake of Barack Obama's Election, Probing 'American Exceptionalism' and Its Discontents in the 21st Century
Reviewed By David M. Kinchen
Huntingtonnews.net Book Critic
O would some power the giftie gie us to see ourselves as others see us.
(O would some power the gift to give us to see ourselves as others see us.) -- Poem "To a Louse" - verse 8, by Scottish national poet Robert Burns (1759-1796)
Frenchman Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) not only came up with the concept of "American Exceptionalism", he was one of the earliest of a long list of foreigners who came to the United States, poking and probing and trying to figure out what makes us tick. His "Democracy in America" (1835) was published after his tour of the U.S. examining our prison system, which was considered the most enlightened in the world in the early 1830s.
The latest Tocqueville is a Briton named Tristram Riley-Smith who worked as a journalist before attending Cambridge University where he completed a Ph.D in social anthropology. In 2002, he took up a three-year posting to the British Embassy in Washington DC, and has spent much of the first decade of the twenty-first century gathering and analyzing material for his book "The Cracked Bell: America and the Afflictions of Liberty" (Skyhorse Publishing, 336 pages, $26.95).
Riley-Smith points out, as if we need any reminding, what a rough first decade of the 21st Century America -- and the rest of the world-- has been through, what with 9/11, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (he provides a very good succinct analysis of the current ever-expanding American Military-Industrial complex), natural disasters like Katrina and devastating wildfires, and the financial meltdown of 2008 that saw the rescue of Wall Street while the rest of the nation had to fend for itself. Nobody has rescued millions of Americans who've lost their jobs and/or their houses. For many people, the historic election of Barack Obama holds out hope for change "we can believe in."
Tocqueville's idea of American Exceptionalism was a politically neutral description of a nation that occupies a special niche among the nations of the world in terms of its national credo, historical evolution, political and religious institutions and unique origins as a country of immigrants and the first modern democracy. The idea of American Exceptionalism today is heavily politicized and is generally opposed by liberals and supported by conservatives, at least in the present scheme of thinking.
Anyone who comes from abroad and examines the States will naturally be compared to Tocqueville, but Riley-Smith prefers to be compared to fellow Briton and social anthropologist Geoffrey Gorer who in 1948 published a book titled "The Americans: A Study in National Character." I also saw similarities in Riley-Smith's approach to that employed by John Gunther in his "Inside U.S.A." in the 1940s and by John Steinbeck in his "Travels With Charley" in the 1960s.
To prepare for his 1947 "Inside U.S.A.", Chicago-born journalist Gunther (1901-1970) traveled extensively, interviewing political, social, and business leaders, talked with average people, reviewed area statistics, and then wrote an outstanding, very readable book.
To quite a large extent Riley-Smith notes, exceptionalism still pervades the U.S., with its large number of churchgoers, especially compared to Europe; with its lack of a universal health care (even with the health care reform bill passed by Congress last month this still holds true); and with proclamations of peace by a nation at war and with military bases in dozens of countries -- including one that just this week had a coup overthrowing its government and is full of consonants (the former Soviet republic of Kyrgyzstan, now an independent nation in Central Asia).
With lively, insightful commentary, careful research, and illuminating personal anecdotes, Riley-Smith uses images like the cracked liberty bell that was shipped to the Colonies in 1752 to explain where things went wrong, and how we can make them right. He touches upon big issues and examines America’s consumer culture, using recognizable icons like Martha Stewart, Giorgio Armani, artist Barbara Kruger, and Wal-Mart. He uses movies like "Deliverance" and "Animal House" to illuminate subjects like the disappearing wilderness and the ubiquity of fraternities and sororities -- "Greek" life -- on American college and university campuses. It's the kind of book you'll be able to read over and over again, if only because you'll miss the nuances the first time.
Riley-Smith's book gets both thumbs up from me. It's written in a lively journalistic style, not in dry academese, so it can be enjoyed and understood by the general reader. If you're a fan of the late historian Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States", you'll like "The Cracked Bell." I can even visualize this book as a textbook, one that students would actually enjoy reading.
* * *
About the Author: Tristam Riley-Smith has lectured on the anthropology of art at the Smithsonian Institution and contributed to a Dictionary of Classical Reference in English Poetry, Travellers' Dictionary of Quotations and Macmillan's Encyclopaedia of Art. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a member of the British-American Pilgrims Society. He is married with three sons.
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BOOK REVIEW: 'The Cracked Bell': A Brit Pulls a Tocqueville in the Wake of Barack Obama's Election, Probing 'American Exceptionalism' and Its Discontents in the 21st Century
Reviewed By David M. Kinchen
Huntingtonnews.net Book Critic
O would some power the giftie gie us to see ourselves as others see us.
(O would some power the gift to give us to see ourselves as others see us.) -- Poem "To a Louse" - verse 8, by Scottish national poet Robert Burns (1759-1796)
Frenchman Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) not only came up with the concept of "American Exceptionalism", he was one of the earliest of a long list of foreigners who came to the United States, poking and probing and trying to figure out what makes us tick. His "Democracy in America" (1835) was published after his tour of the U.S. examining our prison system, which was considered the most enlightened in the world in the early 1830s.
The latest Tocqueville is a Briton named Tristram Riley-Smith who worked as a journalist before attending Cambridge University where he completed a Ph.D in social anthropology. In 2002, he took up a three-year posting to the British Embassy in Washington DC, and has spent much of the first decade of the twenty-first century gathering and analyzing material for his book "The Cracked Bell: America and the Afflictions of Liberty" (Skyhorse Publishing, 336 pages, $26.95).
Riley-Smith points out, as if we need any reminding, what a rough first decade of the 21st Century America -- and the rest of the world-- has been through, what with 9/11, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (he provides a very good succinct analysis of the current ever-expanding American Military-Industrial complex), natural disasters like Katrina and devastating wildfires, and the financial meltdown of 2008 that saw the rescue of Wall Street while the rest of the nation had to fend for itself. Nobody has rescued millions of Americans who've lost their jobs and/or their houses. For many people, the historic election of Barack Obama holds out hope for change "we can believe in."
Tocqueville's idea of American Exceptionalism was a politically neutral description of a nation that occupies a special niche among the nations of the world in terms of its national credo, historical evolution, political and religious institutions and unique origins as a country of immigrants and the first modern democracy. The idea of American Exceptionalism today is heavily politicized and is generally opposed by liberals and supported by conservatives, at least in the present scheme of thinking.
Anyone who comes from abroad and examines the States will naturally be compared to Tocqueville, but Riley-Smith prefers to be compared to fellow Briton and social anthropologist Geoffrey Gorer who in 1948 published a book titled "The Americans: A Study in National Character." I also saw similarities in Riley-Smith's approach to that employed by John Gunther in his "Inside U.S.A." in the 1940s and by John Steinbeck in his "Travels With Charley" in the 1960s.
To prepare for his 1947 "Inside U.S.A.", Chicago-born journalist Gunther (1901-1970) traveled extensively, interviewing political, social, and business leaders, talked with average people, reviewed area statistics, and then wrote an outstanding, very readable book.
To quite a large extent Riley-Smith notes, exceptionalism still pervades the U.S., with its large number of churchgoers, especially compared to Europe; with its lack of a universal health care (even with the health care reform bill passed by Congress last month this still holds true); and with proclamations of peace by a nation at war and with military bases in dozens of countries -- including one that just this week had a coup overthrowing its government and is full of consonants (the former Soviet republic of Kyrgyzstan, now an independent nation in Central Asia).
With lively, insightful commentary, careful research, and illuminating personal anecdotes, Riley-Smith uses images like the cracked liberty bell that was shipped to the Colonies in 1752 to explain where things went wrong, and how we can make them right. He touches upon big issues and examines America’s consumer culture, using recognizable icons like Martha Stewart, Giorgio Armani, artist Barbara Kruger, and Wal-Mart. He uses movies like "Deliverance" and "Animal House" to illuminate subjects like the disappearing wilderness and the ubiquity of fraternities and sororities -- "Greek" life -- on American college and university campuses. It's the kind of book you'll be able to read over and over again, if only because you'll miss the nuances the first time.
Riley-Smith's book gets both thumbs up from me. It's written in a lively journalistic style, not in dry academese, so it can be enjoyed and understood by the general reader. If you're a fan of the late historian Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States", you'll like "The Cracked Bell." I can even visualize this book as a textbook, one that students would actually enjoy reading.
* * *
About the Author: Tristam Riley-Smith has lectured on the anthropology of art at the Smithsonian Institution and contributed to a Dictionary of Classical Reference in English Poetry, Travellers' Dictionary of Quotations and Macmillan's Encyclopaedia of Art. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a member of the British-American Pilgrims Society. He is married with three sons.
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