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The Lies That Bind

Audiobook
Nonfiction: Motivational, Social Sciences, Self-Help
Unabridged   7.25 hour(s)
Publication date: 10/16/2018

The Lies That Bind

Rethinking Identity

Available from major retailers or BUY FROM AMAZON
Audio CD ISBN:9781684413560
Digital Download ISBN:9781684413577

Summary

From the bestselling author of Cosmopolitanism comes this revealing exploration of how the collective identities that shape our polarized world are riddled with contradiction.

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Product Description

We all know how identities—notably, those of nationality, class, culture, race, and religion—are at the root of global conflict, but the more elusive truth is that these identities are created by conflict in the first place. In provocative, entertaining chapters, Kwame Anthony Appiah interweaves keen-edged argument with engrossing historical tales—from Anton Wilhelm Amo, the eighteenth-century African child who became an eminent European academic, to Italo Svevo, the literary genius who changed countries without leaving home—and reveals the tangled contradictions within the stories that define us. The concept of the sovereign nation, Appiah shows us, is incoherent. Our everyday notions of race are the detritus of discarded science; the very idea of Western culture is a shimmering mirage. These beliefs, and more, are crafted from confusions—confusions Appiah sorts through to imagine a more hopeful future.

Reviews/Praise

"Appiah reads comfortably and brightly, leading us through a journey that begins to address the questions he raises about how we see ourselves. He also paces himself so we can follow his lively story." —AudioFile

“Excellent… Appiah hopes to inspire a rethinking of our restrictive and therefore divisive notions of who we are. But if that seems an impossible task, should the massive obstacles stop us from trying? [Appiah] brings to the task a number of insights and the mind of a realist… if the solution to the fracturing of our world remains elusive, this book at least helps us think clearly about the problem.” —Clifford Thompson, The Washington Post

The Lies That Bind ranges even more widely in time and space than [Francis Fukuyama's] Identity… The point of this entertaining, meandering journey is that identities are less solid than is frequently thought.” —The Economist

Author Bio

Kwame Anthony Appiah pens the Ethicist column for the New York Times, and is the author of the prize-winning Cosmopolitanism, among many other works. A professor of philosophy and law at New York University, Appiah lives in New York.