Support H-Net | Buy Books Here | Help Support the NBN and NBN en Español on Patreon | Visit New Books Network en Español!
- African Studies
- African American Studies
- American Politics
- American Studies
- American South
- American West
- Asian American Studies
- Australian and New Zealand Studies
- British Studies
- Canadian Studies
- Caribbean Studies
- Central Asian Studies
- Chinese Studies
- East Asian Studies
- Eastern European Studies
- European Politics
- French Studies
- German Studies
- Iberian Studies
- India Studies
- Indian Ocean World
- Iranian Studies
- Irish Studies
- Israel Studies
- Italian Studies
- Japanese Studies
- Korean Studies
- Latino Studies
- Latin American Studies
- Mexican Studies
- Middle Eastern Studies
- Native American Studies
- Pacific Studies
- Polish Studies
- Russian and Eurasian Studies
- Southeast Asian Studies
- South Asian Studies
- Turkish Studies
- Ukrainian Studies
- Western European Studies
- World Affairs
- Animal Studies
- Anthropology
- Archaeology
- Business, Management, and Marketing
- Media
- Critical Theory
- Disability Studies
- Drugs, Addiction and Recovery
- Education
- Economics
- Finance
- Geography
- Gender Studies
- Genocide Studies
- Higher Education
- Human Rights
- Journalism
- Language
- Law
- LGBTQ+ Studies
- National Security
- Philosophy
- Policing, Incarceration, and Reform
- Political Science
- Politics & Polemics
- Public Policy
- Sex, Sexuality, and Sex Work
- Sociology
- Sound Studies
- Sports
- Urban Studies
- Big Ideas
- Celebration Studies
- Co-Authored
- Cover Story
- Historical Materialism
- History Ex Silo
- Invested Investor
- Landscape Architecture
- Mormonism
- NBN Book of the Day
- NBN Seminar
- Postscript
- Practical History
- Preparing for Life After Grad School
- Psychology and Climate Change
- Interpretive Political and Social Science
Apr 17, 2011
Winning
Reflections on an American Obsession
Summary
"Winning is everything" is such a common phrase that we rarely question where it comes from and why we apply it to everyday experiences. One can win a little league game, an election, the lottery, a friendly competition at work or an unfriendly one. Entrepreneurs can win in business and patients aspire to win their battles over cancer and other sickness. We can win in life itself, and as the actor Charlie Sheen has recently told us, we can actually be "bi-winning" in our struggles with swings of mania and depression.
In Winning: Reflections on an American Obsession (Princeton University Press, 2010), Francesco Duina's attempts to discover where this fascination with winning comes from, and why as Americans we're so fond of using the concept in almost everything that we do. Behind our drive to win, he claims, is our desire for differentiation - the longing to be set apart from the rest, and to prove to others and ourselves that we are legitimate and right. But when Duina explores winning outside of the American context, he finds that not all societies share equally in this obsession.
President Obama has recently challenged Americans to "win the future." In this book, Francesco Duina tells us why Obama--and so many Americans--considers the future and everything else a kind of zero-sum game.
This week's episode of new books in sociology is hosted by David Phillippi.
