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The Twilight of Common Dreams: why America Is Wracked by Culture Wars

The author focuses on the politics of textbook adoption in Oakland, California, in the early 1990s. The textbooks under consideration, written by a well-known multiculturalist and former leftist activist, were attacked as racist. Meanwhile, Gitlin notes, the larger issue, the fact that state funding of education has been repeatedly slashed, goes undebated. Widening his discussion, Gitlin goes on to talk about the decline of the Left, whose preoccupation with the needs of select "identities" and "cultures" has caused the movement to squander its energy on petty turf wars. He also argues that the Right, formerly associated with privileged interests, now claims to speak for the common good.

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  • "Why America is wracked by culture wars"@en

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  • "In The Twilight of Common Dreams, Todd Gitlin places the debates of the moment in a sweeping historical context and - sparing no sides - he argues that these highly charged conflicts are a sideshow, obscuring a seismic transformation in American political life. The Left, which once stood for universal values, has come to be identified with the special needs of distinct "cultures" and select "identities." The Right, long associated with privileged interests, now claims to defend the needs of all. The consequences are clear: since the late 1960s, while the Right has been busy taking the White House, the Left has been marching on the English department. With dazzling range and acuteness, Gitlin's analysis moves through American history and modern thought, from academic squabbles to the crisis in the Democratic party, from embattled school boards to the right-wing exploitation of those scarlet letters, "PC." In the end, he maintains, the culture wars are evasions of America's deepest trauma - inequality - and he eloquently contends that America is lost unless its obsession with cultural differences can be transcended in the name of the common good."
  • "The author focuses on the politics of textbook adoption in Oakland, California, in the early 1990s. The textbooks under consideration, written by a well-known multiculturalist and former leftist activist, were attacked as racist. Meanwhile, Gitlin notes, the larger issue, the fact that state funding of education has been repeatedly slashed, goes undebated. Widening his discussion, Gitlin goes on to talk about the decline of the Left, whose preoccupation with the needs of select "identities" and "cultures" has caused the movement to squander its energy on petty turf wars. He also argues that the Right, formerly associated with privileged interests, now claims to speak for the common good."@en

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  • "The twilight of common dreams why America is wracked by culture wars"
  • "The Twilight of Common Dreams: why America Is Wracked by Culture Wars"@en
  • "The twilight of common dreams : why America is wracked by culture wars"@en
  • "The twilight of common dreams : why America is wracked by culture wars"
  • "The twilight of common dreams ; why America is wracked by culture wars"

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