Self-Help Books: Why Americans Keep Reading Them - Softcover

Dolby, Sandra K.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0252075188 ISBN 13: 9780252075186

Publisher: University of Illinois Press, 2008

Synopsis

Understanding instead of lamenting the popularity of self-help books

Based on a reading of more than three hundred self-help books, Sandra K. Dolby examines this remarkably popular genre to define "self-help" in a way that's compelling to academics and lay readers alike. Self-Help Books also offers an interpretation of why these books are so popular, arguing that they continue the well-established American penchant for self-education, they articulate problems of daily life and their supposed solutions, and that they present their content in a form and style that is accessible rather than arcane.

Using tools associated with folklore studies, Dolby then examines how the genre makes use of stories, aphorisms, and a worldview that is at once traditional and contemporary. The overarching premise of the study is that self-help books, much like fairy tales, take traditional materials, especially stories and ideas, and recast them into extended essays that people happily read, think about, try to apply, and then set aside when a new embodiment of the genre comes along. 

About this title

About the Author

Sandra K. Dolby, director of the Folklore Institute and professor of folklore and American studies at Indiana University, is the author of Literary Folkloristics and the Personal Narrative.
 

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Illinois Press
• Publication date: 2008
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0252075188
• ISBN 13: 9780252075186
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 208