Hyperculture

The rampant illnesses of our society--including the disintegration of the family, the degradation of the environment, unlimited commercialism, and unrelenting stress--are familiar to us all. For the first time, author Stephen Bertman attempts to explain these disparate, overwhelmingly negative phenomena with a single, unifying principle: that the accelerated pace of American society is eroding the essence of our most fundamental values. In 1970, Alvin Toffler identified a psycho-biological disease he called "future shock" caused by "too much change in too short a time." Now Bertman daringly diagnoses an even more serious condition, "hyperculture," a chronic warping of morals and ethics caused by America's addiction to speed. The treatment, he argues in this book, will require nothing less than a drastic slowdown--we must reassert control over the technologies that now dominate us in order to insure a humane future for our children and ourselves.

STEPHEN BERTMAN, Ph.D., is Professor of Classical and Modern Languages, Literatures, and Civilizations at Canada's University of Windsor.