A Short History of Rudeness: Manners, Morals, and Misbehavior in Modern America
Books / Paperback
Books › History › United States › 20th Century
ISBN: 0312263899 / Publisher: Picador, July 2000
Offers an exploration of the slow death of manners and the steady triumph of boorishness in America, showing how the decline of manners has a long and socially significant history.
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The perceived breakdown of civility has in recent years become a national obsession, and our modern climate of boorishness has cultivated a host of etiquette watchdogs, like Miss Manners and Martha Stewart, who defend us against an onslaught of nastiness. Touching on aspects of both our public and private lives, including work, family, and sex, literary and social critic Mark Caldwell examines how the rules of behavior inevitably change and explains why, no matter how hard we try, we can never return to a golden era of civilized manners and mores.
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