On scandal : moral disturbances in society, politics, and art

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  • Author: Adut, Ari
    Summary:

    Scandal is the quintessential public event. Here is the first general and comprehensive analysis of this ubiquitous moral phenomenon. Taking up wide-ranging cases in society, politics, and art, Ari Adut shows when wrongdoings generate scandals and when they do not. He focuses on the emotional and cognitive experience of scandals and the relationships among those who are involved in or exposed to them. This perspective explains variations in the effects, frequency, elicited reactions, outcomes, and strategic uses of scandals. On Scandal offers provocative accounts of the Oscar Wilde, Watergate, and Lewinsky affairs. Adut also employs the lens of scandal to address puzzles and questions regarding public life. Why is American politics plagued by sex scandals? What is the cause of the rise in political scandals in Western democracies? Why were Victorians sometimes very accommodating and other times very intolerant of homosexuality? What is the social logic of hypocrisy? Why has transgression been so central to modern art?

    Contents:
    • The disruptive publicity of transgression
    • The fall of Oscar Wilde
    • The presidency, imperial and imperiled
    • Investigating corruption in France
    • Sex and the American public sphere
    • Provocation in art.
    Genre: Social science
    Subject(s): History
    Original Publisher: Cambridge [England] ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2008
    Language(s): English

Details

Abstract

Scandal is the quintessential public event. Here is the first general and comprehensive analysis of this ubiquitous moral phenomenon. Taking up wide-ranging cases in society, politics, and art, Ari Adut shows when wrongdoings generate scandals and when they do not. He focuses on the emotional and cognitive experience of scandals and the relationships among those who are involved in or exposed to them. This perspective explains variations in the effects, frequency, elicited reactions, outcomes, and strategic uses of scandals. On Scandal offers provocative accounts of the Oscar Wilde, Watergate, and Lewinsky affairs. Adut also employs the lens of scandal to address puzzles and questions regarding public life. Why is American politics plagued by sex scandals? What is the cause of the rise in political scandals in Western democracies? Why were Victorians sometimes very accommodating and other times very intolerant of homosexuality? What is the social logic of hypocrisy? Why has transgression been so central to modern art?

Genre
Social science
Subject
History
Publisher (Source)

Cambridge [England] ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2008

Not specified
ISBN

9780521895897

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