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39 of 47 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Disappointing, June 2, 2002
This review is from: Violence: Reflections on a National Epidemic (Paperback)
James Gilligan's *Violence* is a provocative read. The author is absolutely correct when he sees violence as a problem of epidemic proportions. His interpretation of violence as a disease and consequent search for the best preventive medicine strategies to counteract it, is also potentially fruitful. Finally, Gilligan's claim that the root cause of violence is shame is intriguing and well worth taking seriously--although not, perhaps, as seriously as Gilligan wishes. Having said this, however, there are serious flaws in this book. In the first place, it's horribly written and horribly edited. The book is over-long, maddeningly redundant, and choppy in presentation. Gilligan's central shame thesis is repeated again and again; Chapter 5 is basically a rewrite of Chapters 2 and 3; chapter 4 could've been condensed into a couple of paragraphs; the Prologue and Epilogue are over-long and rather gratuitous; and to top everything off, Gilligan writes Chapter 5 as if it's the real beginning of the book (which it actually is), even including an Introduction-like summary of the chapters that follow. It's as if he combined two manuscripts to make one book. The poor style of presentation is enough to cause even patient and sympathetic readers to hair-pull. Moreover, it's difficult to see that Gilligan really establishes his central thesis: that shame is the root of violence. I would argue that he begs the question, ignoring as he does the obvious point that not all experiences of shame result in recognizable violence. Sometimes--perhaps usually, as a matter of fact--shame leads to renewed determination to succeed in order to redeem past offences. (The schoolchild "shamed" by a poor grade can resolve to study real hard in order to show her classmates, teacher, and parents that in fact she's got what it takes.) What Gilligan doesn't do is to explain how it's possible that some shame experiences lead to violence and others don't. But without an attempt to make sense of this, the whole thesis collapses. What appears to really be at stake, then, isn't whether violence is caused by shame, but why most people who experience shame don't turn to violence. Still, Gilligan is to be commended for his insight that there's at least some connection between shame and violence, even if he overplays it. My guess is that the soul-killing varieties of shame he discusses in Chapter 2 best fit his model, and he's actually at his best when discussing them. Moreover, his thesis raises intriguing possibilities for national and international public policy, as well as personal relationships and educational reform. If Gilligan is even partly correct, we might be able to go a good way toward reducing violence between individuals, classes, and nations by making sure that social and economic structures that "dis" others are reformed. Despite my criticisms, I recommend this book. Gilligan comes across as a compassionate and concerned man, and his book, if read judiciously, contributes to the continuing dialogue about violence and nonviolence.
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16 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Education Strategies for Prevention of Violence, January 26, 2000
This review is from: Violence: Reflections on a National Epidemic (Paperback)
[Please use the following review in place of my previous review, which I have found contains a few typos.] The most hopeful insight Gilligan offers about violence is: A person's tortuous, shameful sense of self prompts the act of murder to "symbolically" silence the ridicule one has endured. Does this sound remarkably similar to those humiliated young teenagers who feel compelled to avenge their pain with murderous revenge against their taunting classmates? Gilligan's book offers a sign of hope, for if we are able to significantly prevent violence, it will come from focusing on the underlying "incapacitating feelings" we humans experience when we are repeatedly emotionally wounded. In my new book on education strategies for prevention of violence, I address our cultural reluctance to educate children (and their parents) about the critical importance of understanding their inner reaction to being emotionally wounded. Gilligan, in his own way, seems to be advocating that violent consequences follow blaming others for what WE feel, and then symbolically attempting to punish them (with murder) for our sense of shame. We need more parents, teachers and emotional educators who can demonstrate a healthy and honest way of dealing with emotional wounds other than shaming ourselves or blaming others. It is not rocket science to LEARN how to deal with painful feelings. It is just that we have a deeply embedded cultural tendency to ignore and let our pain build up within us until it erupts into what Gilligan calls the "ritual" of murder. I would venture that few, if any, persons who commit violence were ever taught how to name, own and honor their hurt feelings as a normal -- not shameful -- part of their human vulnerability.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The key to understanding violence in schools and society!, May 21, 1999
This review is from: Violence: Reflections on a National Epidemic (Paperback)
As a scholar who has spent the last 3 years trying to understand what drives men (and now boys) to the extremes that we have witnessed at the Dunblane (Scotland) Elementary School - 19 dead, (March, 1996), the Port Arthur (Tasmania) Historic Site - 35 dead (April 1996), on through a litany of American towns right up to the Columbine High School in Littleton, CO in April 99, I have found the greatest insight into these actions in Gilligan's book. He asserts that at the root of the worst violence, indeed all violence, is shame. I concur. This book must be required for parents, teachers, psychologists, anyone concerned with the roots of violence. Guns provide the means (the British and Australians were wise enough to legislate gun controls after their respective disasters), shame is the driving force behind each of the cases of horror we witness all too frequently!
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