Synopses & Reviews
The chorus of the Christian hymn and#147;Amazing Graceand#8221; reads, and#147;I once was lost, but now am found, / Was blind but now I see.and#8221; Composed by a minister who formerly worked as a slave trader, the song expresses his experience of divine intervention that ultimately caused him to see the error of his ways. This theme of personal awakening is a feature of countless stories throughout history, where the and#147;lostand#8221; and the and#147;blindand#8221; are saved from darkness and despair by suddenly seeing the light.
and#160;
Inand#160;Seeing the Light, Thomas DeGloma explores such accounts of personal awakening, in stories that range from the discovery of a religious truth to remembering a childhood trauma to embracing a new sexual orientation. He reveals a common social pattern: When people discover a life-changing truth, they typically ally with a new community. Individuals then use these autobiographical stories to shape their stances on highly controversial issues such as childhood abuse, war and patriotism, political ideology, human sexuality, and religion. Thus, while such stories are seemingly very personal, they also have a distinctly social nature. Tracing a wide variety of narratives through nearly three thousand years of history,and#160;Seeing the Lightand#160;uncovers the common threads of such stories and reveals the crucial, little-recognized social logic of personal discovery.
Review
"His [Stromberg's] transcriptions are especially valuable because they provide vivid illustration of the nature of contemporary conversions and, through the salient differences between these and the more ancient paradigms, are provocative for studies of the evolution in doctrines of conversion over the course of two millenia. Stromberg's arguments are pointedly relevant to the contemporary experiences of metanoia and, in their own ways, validate the power of those experiences to transform and to heal." Semiotica"So painstaking and detailed is this analysis....Stromberg writes as a psychological anthropologist, but his book will be of interest to a much wider audience; any serious student of conversion will find this argument interesting." Choice"This is an important work for those who are working with or indeed telling EHE narratives." Exceptional Human Experience
Review
and#8220;This is one of the best books I have read in a long time. Eschewing simplistic approaches, DeGloma brings a full arsenal of tools from cultural sociology, ritual theory, moral philosophy, and semiotics to develop a rich account of awakening narratives. For anyone interested in autobiographical accounts and the roles they play in social life, Seeing the Light is the book to read.and#8221;and#160;
Review
and#8220;Seeing the Light is a fascinating study of a class of public stories that Thomas DeGloma calls awakening narrativesand#8212;autobiographical accounts of religious conversion, political transformation, identity alteration, and the like. While some of these types have been studied in isolation, DeGloma shows how such stories, recounting a fundamental change of mind and heart and at first glance seemingly unrelated, not only share a common narrative structure but play formally similar roles in society. Lucidly written, tightly-organized, and richly illustrated, Seeing the Light is a remarkable achievement.and#8221;
Review
and#8220;Individual epiphanies that awaken the self to a new world seem unique and ineffable. Yet DeGloma shows us how our narratives of awakening are patterned and generic as we recount them in autobiographical communities. Seeing the Light sheds its own masterful light on autobiography and autobiographical narrative. Anyone interested in the dynamic nature of the relation of self and society should read this book.and#8221;
Review
"Stories of personal transformation are all around us. Seeing the Light excavates the timeless logic of their deep meaning structures. At the same time DeGloma shows them to be socially grounded in specific communities of interpretation, solidarity and contention. As such this important book suggests new and much needed paths for connecting cultural sociology to the study of the self."
Review
"More and more people want to know about stories and narratives. In this elegant book, Thomas DeGloma inspects one major and widespread genre: the awareness story. Drawing on a rich vein of writing, he inspects its foundations, forms and formulas suggesting its deep logic and defining characteristics. All future scholars of the diverse array of awareness stories will have to take this book as a benchmark."
Synopsis
Using the Christian conversion narrative as a primary example, this book examines how people deal with emotional conflict through language.
Description
Includes bibliographical references (p. 138-144) and index.
About the Author
Thomas DeGloma
Table of Contents
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
1 Discovering and#147;Truthand#8221;
Awakenings
Three Dimensions of Autobiographical Work
The Awakening-Story Formula
The Semiotic Stricture of Awakening Stories
The Awakener as a Social Type of Storyteller
Autobiographical Communities and Autobiographical Fields
Methods and Data
Outline of the Book
2 Awakenings: A Cultural History
Zarathustra
Platoand#8217;s Allegory of the Cave
Foundational Religious Awakenings
Foundational Political Awakenings
Freud and the Psychoanalytic Case Study
Late Modern Awakenings
Conclusion
3 Mnemonic Revisions and Cultural Contentions
Formulaic Mnemonic Revisions
Autobiographical Memory and Cultural Contention
Shaping the Collective Mnemonic Record
Shaping the Cultural Milieu for Personal Memory
Conclusion
4 Vocabularies of Liminality
Sociomental Express Elevators
Sociomental Staircases
Combining Elevators and Staircases
Conclusion
5 The Temporally Divided Self
Portraying the Temporally Divided Self
Conclusion
6 Culture and Autobiographical Narrative
Notes References Index