Bowling Alone : The Collapse and Revival of American Community (edit title)

Shelfari edited the description of Bowling Alone : The Collapse and Revival of American Community Monday, August 3 2009.

• Once we bowled in leagues, usually after work -- but no longer. This seemingly small phenomenon symbolizes a significant social change that Robert Putnam has identified in this brilliant volume, Bowling Alone, which The Economist hailed as "a prodigious achievement." Drawing on vast new data that reveal Americans' changing behavior, Putnam shows how we have become increasingly disconnected from one another and how social structures -- whether they be PTA, church, or political parties -- have disintegrated. Until the publication of this groundbreaking work, no one had so deftly diagnosed the harm that these broken bonds have wreaked on our physical and civic health, nor had anyone exalted their fundamental power in creating a society that is happy, healthy, and safe. Like defining works from the past, such as The Lonely Crowd and The Affluent Society, and like the works of C. Wright Mills and Betty Friedan, Putnam's Bowling Alone has identified a central crisis at the heart of our society and suggests what we can do.

Shelfari edited the contributors of Bowling Alone : The Collapse and Revival of American Community Tuesday, July 21 2009.

• reordered the contributors.
• 1 : Robert D. Putnam:

Shelfari edited the contributors of Bowling Alone : The Collapse and Revival of American Community Friday, July 17 2009.

• Added a contributor: Robert D. Putnam: (Primary Author)

Shelfari edited the first sentence of Bowling Alone : The Collapse and Revival of American Community Friday, July 17 2009.

• NO ONE IS LEFT from the Glenn Valley, Pennsylvania, Bridge Club who can tell us precisely when or why the group broke up, even though its forty-odd members were still playing regularly as recently as 1990, just as they had done for more than half a century.