What are hard and soft individualisms? In this detailed ethnography of three communities in Manhattan and Queens, Kusserow interviews parents and teachers (from wealthy to those on welfare) on the types of hard and soft individualisms they encourage in their children and students. American Individualisms explores the important issue of class differences in the socialization of individualism in America. It presents American individualism not as one single homogeneous, stereotypic life-pattern as often claimed to be, but as variable, class-differentiated models of individualism instilled in...

What are hard and soft individualisms? In this detailed ethnography of three communities in Manhattan and Queens, Kusserow interviews parents and teachers (from wealthy to those on welfare) on the types of hard and soft individualisms they encourage in their children and students. American Individualisms explores the important issue of class differences in the socialization of individualism in America. It presents American individualism not as one single homogeneous, stereotypic life-pattern as often claimed to be, but as variable, class-differentiated models of individualism instilled in...

Drawing from her work in comparative religion and cultural anthropology, Adrie Kusserow offers a collection of portraits of Westerners in the East and Easterners in the West struggling to relearn and relive their ideas of culture, religion, and God. These poems expose the human craving for the nourishment of a spiritual life. Celebrated poet Karen Swenson has written the Foreword. Adrie Kusserow received her Ph.D. in social anthropology from Harvard University in 1996 and is currently associate professor of cultural anthropology at St. Michael's College in Vermont. She continues to do...