Private Matters: In Defense of the Personal Life - Hardcover

Smith, Janna Malamud

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0201409739 ISBN 13: 9780201409734

Publisher: Perseus Books, 1997

Synopsis

In this eloquent and reflective book, Janna Malamud Smith traces a modern history of privacy, revealing how our inner and outer lives are nurtured by this fragile virtue.Today we enjoy more privacy than ever before, yet the encroachment of the media, computer data gathering, and electronic surveillance in our lives undermines our sense that we have any privacy at all. Smith argues that having a say in when and how we watch one another is key to ongoing debates about freedom. Our ideal of individual liberty--a person who is free to make choices about her own life--is not possible without the protection of privacy.Yet privacy can be used for the wrong reasons. The same condition that sustains intimacy, creativity, and freedom can also be invoked as an abusive kind of secrecy. to explore this paradox Smith looks at privacy refracted through various prisms: the bedroom, the psychiatrist's couch, the biographer's quest for information, the presidency and presidential families, the news media, women and their bodies. We see the supple quality of privacy as we look at its role in everyday life; we see how essential it is to our capacity to love and create and think--to our humanity.Combining the emotional sensitivity of a psychotherapist with the insights of a literary writer, Janna Malamud Smith offers a compelling portrait of one of the most precious aspects of life. Her book shows us that, indeed, privacy matters.

About this title

Review:

"Weaving together history, literature, and psychology, Janna Smith explores the issues surrounding privacy with such stunning clarity and brilliant insight that one is left almost breathless. The stories she tells are unforgettable, as is the elegant language that illuminates every page."

About this edition

• Publisher: Perseus Books
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0201409739
• ISBN 13: 9780201409734
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 288