Bad Habits: Drinking, Smoking, Taking Drugs, Gambling, Sexual Misbehavior and Swearing in American History (Revised)Paperback - Revised, 1 February 1994

Bad Habits: Drinking, Smoking, Taking Drugs, Gambling, Sexual Misbehavior and Swearing in American History (Revised)
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Part of Series
American Social Experience
Part of Series
American Social Experience (Paperback)
Print Length
378 pages
Language
English
Publisher
New York University Press
Date Published
1 Feb 1994
ISBN-10
081471224X
ISBN-13
9780814712245

Description

The vast majority of Americans have, at one point or another, gotten drunk, smoked, dabbled with drugs, gambled, sworn, or engaged in adultery. During the 1800s, "respectable" people struggled to control these behaviors, labeling them "bad" and the people who indulged in them unrespectable. In the twentieth century, these minor vices were transformed into a societal complex of enormous and pervasive influence. Yet the general belief persists that these activities remain merely harmless "bad habits, " individual transgressions more than social problems. Not so, argues distinguished historian John C. Burnham in this pioneering study. In Bad Habits, Burnham traces the growth of a veritable minor vice-industrial complex illustrating the special heritage shared by these vices. As this vice complex grew, activities that might have been harmless, natural, and sociable fun resulted in fundamental social change. When Burnham set out to explore the influence of these bad habits on American society, he sought to discover why so many "good" people engaged in activities that many, including they themselves, considered "bad." What he found, however, was a coalition of economic and social interests in which the single minded quest for profit allied with the values of the Victorian saloon underworld and bohemian rebelliousness. This combination radically inverted common American standards of personal conduct. Bad Habits, then, describes, in words and pictures how more and more Americans learned to value hedonism and self-gratification - to smoke and swear during World War I, to admire cabaret night life, and to reject schoolmarmish standards in the age of Prohibition. Tracing the evolution of each ofthe bad habits, Burnham tells how liquor control boards encouraged the consumption of alcohol; how alcoholic beverage producers got their workers deferred from the draft during World War II; how convenience stores and accounting firms pursued profits by pushing legalized gambling;

Product Details

Book Edition:
Revised
Book Format:
Paperback
Country of Origin:
US
Date Published:
1 February 1994
Dimensions:
22.86 x 15.04 x 2.44 cm
ISBN-10:
081471224X
ISBN-13:
9780814712245
Language:
English
Location:
New York
Pages:
378
Publisher:
New York University Press
Weight:
598.74 gm

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