Customer Reviews

Shadow Culture: Psychology and Spirituality in America

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

"Boring"--the pet phrase of the adolescent who's "little gray cells" have been overstretched by too much stimulation--is far from a correct portrayal of this fine book. It is a deeply intelligent, constantly fascinating, and highly readable account of the entire sweep of American spirituality, folk psychology, and the American visionary tradition from their beginnings in colonial days. From the visionaries and mystics of early 1700s, to the Quakers and Shakers, to Swedenborg, Blavatsky, and the New England Transcendentalists, and on to the Americanization of Jung and Freud, and finally to the modern transpersonal psychologies and spiritually inspired alternative therapies, this is a record of the passions and history of American spiritual life never before recorded with such clarity. Don't be fooled by trash reviews written by rash undergraduates (of all ages). This is a story without precedent, a landmark in American spiritual and intellectual history written by one of the foremost historians of our age.

The author's comments on the vitriol from the first reviewer of this book reinforce my earlier suspicions about that person's "shadow" agenda. The above "review" is a clear abuse of the privilege offered by Amazon in that it does not refer to the book's content but serves only as a personal whetstone for that individual's puerile and vindictive ax-grinding. It is therefore worthless as a review and should be deleted by the Amazon webmasters. That said, onto the more relevant matter of "Shadow Culture":

Taylor's articulation of the origins and history of one of the three main streams of psychology is an original and highly readable overview of the third stream of alternative spirituality and psychology (the other two being academic and clinical) which, in my 24 years of reading on the subject, has never been so well integrated into one volume. As a historian of Psychology and Psychiatry at Harvard, Taylor is a uniquely qualified "white-water raft guide" through the turbulent waters of these streams. We discover that the so-called New Age did not appear fully formed from the brow of the 1960s, but is merely the third irruption of this stream into our cultural consciousness - this time on a global scale, forming what Maslow called, "a world personality... that can adapt to a variety of different cultures but the essence of which transcends the limits of any given culture." (p.269) The latter part of the book, where Taylor explains the division of Humanistic Psychology into three subparts: Transpersonal Psaychology; Somatic and experiential therapies; and the radical "therapies" from which emerged anti-psychiatry, critical thinking and the human sciences, should be required reading for all psychology students. A further fragmentation of Transpersonal Psychology is then outlined; divided into Grof's research in altered states, Wilber's "theory of everything" models, and the third and largest group of leaderless people without any one center, single worldview or model, making changes in the crucible of their own daily lives. (This "transmodern" group - estimated at around 44 million in North America-was described in a survey of the emerging "Integral Culture" (Noetic Science Review, Spring 1996).) Taylor ends by envisioning a new era of cross-cultural fertilization between East and West, embracing multiple epistemoligies on their own terms and undistorted, this time around, by politically correct cliques of white "sensitive" white new agers from Marin County (my own opinon, supported by W.I. Thompson's book, "Coming into Being" - an excellent companion to this book). Taylor views psychology as a much needed foundation for ALL "knowledge accumulation" incorporating an "iconography of the transcendent" presently lacking in current mainstream psychology. This may lead to a multi-perspectival study of all streams into an "integral psychology" which in turn, this reviewer hopes, may be eventually be replaced by a more radical term... "Psychology".

I almost gave this book a 4-star rating instead of 5 as the publisher failed to include an index - a major oversight in a book so rich in references. However Taylor does provide footnotes to each chapter. I hope they rectify this in the next edition. For the record, I am neither a neighbor, relative nor colleague of Dr. Taylor.

Eugene Taylor offers a great explanation of the shadow culture in America since the first Great Awakening in this book. He explains every aspect of the spiritual history of the United States, including the Quakers, Shakers, Transcendentalists, Swamis, and even the counter-culture of the 1960s. I especially enjoyed the section on the Americanization of the theories of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. I recommend this book to anyone with an interest in psychology or religious studies. As a student of both, I found this book to be an excellent mixture of both disciplines.

Taylor does indeed present an overview of a certain sort of tradition that has not been well-surveyed to this point. His historiography, while not deep, is adequate, given the wide range of material. However, Taylor's own agenda so overwhelms the history that his assessment of particular figures is nearly useless. To contrast broadly the "Western rationalist tradition" with the "Western visionary tradition" - as he does in various ways at every opportunity - is little more than name-calling. His "faith" in something called "pure religious experience" is almost 100 years out-of-date -- has the author not realized that all experience (including religious experience) is shaped by language, culture, and tradition? Unsuspecting readers, beware: a position as a psychitrist at Harvard does not make up for a history that is little more than an advertisement for his own personal spiritual predilection.

I hate to be so negative about a book on spirituality, but Taylor's book is a boring read. There is no new information or any creative insights in this book. It is a regurgitation of stuff that everyone already knows, and it is a superficial survey of New Age culture. Is Taylor trying to position himself as the Workshop Guru of the Week with this new and unnecessary book? I wonder. HAven't we had enough of those guys? Gee, when is someone going to finally write something new and interesting for a change. This book will put you to sleep.

I have read this book through and through, and I have read the brief review pannning the book and the response by the author, Eugene Taylor. I had two reactions: First, I found the author's "rebuttal" rather spooky. It was a mean-spirited response, not at all polite or -- dare I say -- spiritually enlightened, although the author hints at his own ability to see into the great beyond and to know more than the rest of us who are not blessed with such . . . experiences. He is apparently thin-skinned, and perhaps, after I read this book, I now see that he has reason to be. Which brings me to my second point, my review of the book: I found myself in total agreement with the reviewer from Lincoln, Mass. I'm sorry to say this, but the book is boring. And repetitive. And offers a thesis that is not very original at all. I have read many books on the history of New Age spirituality, and this is just so-so.

Like some of the other reviewers I cannot say that this is an interesting book. I have read many New Age books, many of them quite scholarly. This is just not a good book. Sorry, Mr. Taylor -- better luck in the next life, eh?