<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<GoodreadsResponse>
	<Request>
		<authentication>false</authentication>
		    <method><![CDATA[]]></method>
	</Request>
	<review>
  <id>46675570</id>
    <user>
    <id>710201</id>
    <name><![CDATA[Skylar]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[The United States]]></location>
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/710201-skylar-burris]]></link>
    <image_url><![CDATA[http://photo.goodreads.com/users/1222201795p3/710201.jpg]]></image_url>
    <small_image_url><![CDATA[http://photo.goodreads.com/users/1222201795p2/710201.jpg]]></small_image_url>
  </user>
    <book>
  <id type="integer">1822711</id>
  <isbn>0375423745</isbn>
  <isbn13>9780375423741</isbn13>
  <text_reviews_count type="integer">200</text_reviews_count>
  <title>
    <![CDATA[The Age of American Unreason]]>
  </title>
  <image_url>http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1188838347m/1822711.jpg</image_url>
  <small_image_url>http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1188838347s/1822711.jpg</small_image_url>
  <link>http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1822711.The_Age_of_American_Unreason</link>
  <average_rating>3.74</average_rating>
  <ratings_count>562</ratings_count>
  <description>
    <![CDATA[Combining historical analysis with contemporary observation, Susan Jacoby dissects a new American cultural phenomenon--one that is at odds with our heritage of Enlightenment reason and with modern, secular knowledge and science. With mordant wit, she surveys an anti-rationalist landscape extending from pop culture to a pseudo-intellectual universe of &quot;junk thought.&quot;  Disdain for logic and evidence defines a pervasive malaise fostered by the mass media, triumphalist religious fundamentalism, mediocre public education, a dearth of fair-minded public intellectuals on the right and the left, and, above all, a lazy and credulous public.<br/><br/>Jacoby offers an unsparing indictment of the American addiction to infotainment--from television to the Web--and cites this toxic dependency as the major element distinguishing our current age of unreason from earlier outbreaks of American anti-intellectualism and anti-rationalism.  With reading on the decline and scientific and historical illiteracy on the rise, an increasingly ignorant public square is dominated by debased media-driven language and received opinion.<br/><br/>At this critical political juncture, nothing could be more important than recognizing the &quot;overarching crisis of memory and knowledge&quot; described in this impassioned, tough-minded book, which challenges Americans to face the painful truth about what the flights from reason has cost us as individuals and as a nation.]]>
  </description>
<authors>
    <author>
    <id>259719</id>
        <name><![CDATA[Susan Jacoby]]></name>
    <image_url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-F-200x266.jpg]]></image_url>
    <small_image_url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-F-50x66.jpg]]></small_image_url>
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/259719.Susan_Jacoby]]></link>
    <average_rating>3.83</average_rating>
    <ratings_count>885</ratings_count>
    <text_reviews_count>264</text_reviews_count>
  </author>
  </authors>  <published>2008</published>
</book>

    <user_statuses>
        <user_status>
  <body>I'm intrigued but already feel I will find much to criticize, and, really, she wouldn't want me not to exercise my critical faculties on her</body>
  <chapter type="integer" nil="true"></chapter>
  <comments_count type="integer">0</comments_count>
  <created_at type="datetime">2009-02-21T18:24:53-08:00</created_at>
  <id type="integer">415375</id>
  <last_comment_at type="datetime" nil="true"></last_comment_at>
  <page type="integer">20</page>
  <updated_at type="datetime">2009-02-21T18:24:53-08:00</updated_at>
</user_status>

      </user_statuses>
    <rating>0</rating>
  <votes>8</votes>
  <spoiler_flag>false</spoiler_flag>
  <shelves>
        <shelf name="read" />
            <shelf name="nonfiction" />
        <shelf name="politics" />
      </shelves>
  <recommended_for><![CDATA[]]></recommended_for>
  <recommended_by><![CDATA[]]></recommended_by>
  <read_at>Tue Feb 24 00:00:00 -0800 2009</read_at>
  <date_added>Tue Feb 17 14:59:30 -0800 2009</date_added>
  <date_updated>Sun Dec 20 09:20:33 -0800 2009</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[Because I am a product of the Age of American Unreason, I’m going to begin reviewing this book before I’ve finished reading it. Besides, I don’t have time to read the entire book. I have to watch all the re-runs I’ve DVRed of America’s Biggest Loser and Bachelor, and then I need to fantasi...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/46675570">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/46675570]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/46675570]]></link>
</review>

</GoodreadsResponse>