The Politics of Authenticity

Rating:
Summary: Another Look at the Sixties.
Review: Doug Rossinow's "Politics of Authenticity" is a fascinating book, but in some ways disappointing. He focuses on radical politics at the University of Texas in Austin from the late 50's to the early 70's, interweaving local events with the larger national story. The local focus is a major stength of the book because it puts flesh and blood on what is often seen as a very nebulous "movement". The subtitle of the book promises that Christianity would be one of the major themes to be explored, but it is really very minor, mostly limited to those few individuals who participated in the Faith and Life Community. I found the section on the late 50's and early 60's to be the most intriguing, perhaps because it was less familiar, but I was disappointed in the weak attempts to draw a connection between those early activists and those of the later SDS glory days. Characters come and go throughout the book. Rossinow usually gives some interesting background on each person, and a very brief mention of what they did after college. This is probably beyond the book's scope, but I would love to know more about why the various characters went off in the directions they did after their college rad phase. Partially it is the nature of college that people are transient, but one does get a sense from the book that many of the mid 60's rads simply walked onto campus and took up where their predecessors had left off. Rossinow opens some provokative lines of thought about the relationship between the rads and the counterculture, but he doesn't pursue them fully. The penultimate chapter on feminism is also very interesting in that it shows a new movement groping to define itself and choose its battles, one of which resulted in the Roe v Wade decision. Shortcomings aside, I would still recommend this book highly to anyone interested in the 1960's.

Rating:
Summary: Another Look at the Sixties.
Review: Doug Rossinow's "Politics of Authenticity" is a fascinating book, but in some ways disappointing. He focuses on radical politics at the University of Texas in Austin from the late 50's to the early 70's, interweaving local events with the larger national story. The local focus is a major stength of the book because it puts flesh and blood on what is often seen as a very nebulous "movement". The subtitle of the book promises that Christianity would be one of the major themes to be explored, but it is really very minor, mostly limited to those few individuals who participated in the Faith and Life Community. I found the section on the late 50's and early 60's to be the most intriguing, perhaps because it was less familiar, but I was disappointed in the weak attempts to draw a connection between those early activists and those of the later SDS glory days. Characters come and go throughout the book. Rossinow usually gives some interesting background on each person, and a very brief mention of what they did after college. This is probably beyond the book's scope, but I would love to know more about why the various characters went off in the directions they did after their college rad phase. Partially it is the nature of college that people are transient, but one does get a sense from the book that many of the mid 60's rads simply walked onto campus and took up where their predecessors had left off. Rossinow opens some provokative lines of thought about the relationship between the rads and the counterculture, but he doesn't pursue them fully. The penultimate chapter on feminism is also very interesting in that it shows a new movement groping to define itself and choose its battles, one of which resulted in the Roe v Wade decision. Shortcomings aside, I would still recommend this book highly to anyone interested in the 1960's.

Rating:
Summary: Another Look at the Sixties.
Review: Doug Rossinow's "Politics of Authenticity" is a fascinating book, but in some ways disappointing. He focuses on radical politics at the University of Texas in Austin from the late 50's to the early 70's, interweaving local events with the larger national story. The local focus is a major stength of the book because it puts flesh and blood on what is often seen as a very nebulous "movement". The subtitle of the book promises that Christianity would be one of the major themes to be explored, but it is really very minor, mostly limited to those few individuals who participated in the Faith and Life Community. I found the section on the late 50's and early 60's to be the most intriguing, perhaps because it was less familiar, but I was disappointed in the weak attempts to draw a connection between those early activists and those of the later SDS glory days. Characters come and go throughout the book. Rossinow usually gives some interesting background on each person, and a very brief mention of what they did after college. This is probably beyond the book's scope, but I would love to know more about why the various characters went off in the directions they did after their college rad phase. Partially it is the nature of college that people are transient, but one does get a sense from the book that many of the mid 60's rads simply walked onto campus and took up where their predecessors had left off. Rossinow opens some provokative lines of thought about the relationship between the rads and the counterculture, but he doesn't pursue them fully. The penultimate chapter on feminism is also very interesting in that it shows a new movement groping to define itself and choose its battles, one of which resulted in the Roe v Wade decision. Shortcomings aside, I would still recommend this book highly to anyone interested in the 1960's.

Rating:
Summary: Nothing but the facts...
Review: Rossinow paints a detailed picture at the activist life of the University of Texas during the days of the SDS and SNCC. It is amazing that someone like himself, who wasn't there and is much younger than the participants, can create such a tale. I'm too young to have been there also, but I've had the opportunity to meet some of these incredible people in my time here at UT-Austin. The activist blood still runs warm here, and will for years to come, and it is because of the people Rossinow has chronicled in this book. Want to know how things happened? Here it is. Want to be inspired toward change? Here it is.

Rating:
Summary: Nothing but the facts...
Review: Rossinow paints a detailed picture at the activist life of the University of Texas during the days of the SDS and SNCC. It is amazing that someone like himself, who wasn't there and is much younger than the participants, can create such a tale. I'm too young to have been there also, but I've had the opportunity to meet some of these incredible people in my time here at UT-Austin. The activist blood still runs warm here, and will for years to come, and it is because of the people Rossinow has chronicled in this book. Want to know how things happened? Here it is. Want to be inspired toward change? Here it is.

Rating:
Summary: Engaging/evocative/instructive- -a new generational take!
Review: Rossinow's largely sympathetic--nay, empathetic-- assessment of the legacy of the New Left in our political/cultural history is both refreshing and insightful. That assessment is made more significant, I believe, by Rossinow's not having been part of the events which he chronicles, which he mentions to good effect in his "Introduction" . As one who was sympathetic to the goals of the Students for a Democratic Society (albeit while tucked away in a small state university deep in the Intermountain West), I found his analysis to be nicely balanced and persuasive- -a perfectcounterpoint to the shrill, "Corbett Canyon-like" echoes of the Spiro Agnews, Ronald Reagans (who, on April 7, 1970 was reported to have said in response to the student disturbances at UCB and San Francisco State, "If it takes a blood bath, let's get it over with."), and Max Raffertys who commanded the attentions of the media with their colorful imprecations about the New Left.

Most persuasive was his argument that the roots of the New Left were grounded less in the politics of the "Old Left" than the result of a curious admixture of Christian teachings and liberal principles, all bound together in the search for an authenticity. I doubt whether I or those few of my fellow students who agreed with what the SDS was trying to effect would have had much truck with Rossinow's thesis. In Idaho, few references were heard to elements like Progressive Labor or the Student League for Industrial Democracy; SDS and the Weathermen might be recognized. More simply, most lumped them under the comforting rubric of "commies" or "pinko's." While existential writers were not unknown in the Gem State's universities, the notion of Christian existentialism would have been seen as oxymoronic, notwithstanding an awareness on the part of some of the more activist students of Tillich, Bonhoffer, et. al.

Equally instructive is Rossinow's dissection of the sexist roots underlying much of the SDS posturing. While reading such in early 1999 hardly excites the spirit, the author's linking of certain of those behaviors to similar posturings in the male leadership of the Student Nonviolence Coordinating Committee was revealing, and persuasive, to this reader.

These quibbles are not to suggest that Rossinow errs in his conclusions; rather, they offer a view from the deep hinterlands that was missing from his focusing on the events at the University of Texas and certain of the east coast and midwest campuses. A little less emphasis on the abundant details of the UT and the addition of experiences from other parts of the country might have made his arguments even more persuasive.

Am hoping more Amazon.com readers who were on the campuses in the late 60s will chime in with their "takes" on this most important book!