Bobos In Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There

Bobos In Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There
by David Brooks

Bobos In Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There
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Book Summary Information

Author: David Brooks
Edition: Paperback
Published: 2001-03-06
ISBN: 0684853787
Number of pages: 288
Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Book Reviews of Bobos In Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There

Book Review: Horrible, unsourced, uninformed
Summary: 1 Stars

This book is absolutely horrible. Aside from an almost interesting brief history of bohemia (which was sketchy and obviously tailored to the conclusions the author wished to reach, much like the rest of the book) he simply goes into lauding a caricature of rich professionals and somehow equates that with previous bohemian movements - the equation seeming to be that reading Walden makes you a woodsman, and admiring the Beat Generation in college is the same thing as purposefully leading a life outside of consumer culture. He's trying to sell consumption as art, and doing a rather bad job of even that.

This book, supposedly of a sociological topic, contains absolutely no hard data. Basically it's a way for Brooks to convince himself that he and those around him can buy coolness and authenticity, hundreds of pages to defend replacing artists with lawyers and pretending there's no difference.

If you want something decent about counterculture trends go read either Naomi Klien or Nation of Rebels. If you want something about city trends try American Demographics or maybe Generations. But under no circumstances should you buy this book.

Summary of Bobos In Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There

You've seen them: They sip double-tall, nonfat lattes, chat on cell phones, and listen to NPR while driving their immaculate SUVs to Pottery Barn to shop for $48 titanium spatulas. They tread down specialty cheese aisles in top-of-the-line hiking boots and think nothing of laying down $5 for an olive-wheatgrass muffin. They're the bourgeois bohemians--"Bobos"--an unlikely blend of mainstream culture and 1960s-era counterculture that, according to David Brooks, represents both America's present and future: "These Bobos define our age. They are the new establishment. Their hybrid culture is the atmosphere we all breathe. Their status codes now govern social life." Amusing stereotypes aside, they're an "elite based on brainpower" and merit rather than pedigree or lineage: "Dumb good-looking people with great parents have been displaced by smart, ambitious, educated, and antiestablishment people with scuffed shoes."

Bobos in Paradise is a brilliant, breezy, and often hilarious study of the "cultural consequences of the information age." Large and influential (especially in terms of their buying power), the Bobos have reformed society through culture rather than politics, and Brooks clearly outlines this passing of the high-class torch by analyzing nearly all aspects of life: consumption habits, business and lifestyle choices, entertainment, spirituality, politics, and education. Employing a method he calls "comic sociology," Brooks relies on keen observations, wit, and intelligence rather than statistics and hard theory to make his points. And by copping to his own Bobo status, he comes across as revealing rather than spiteful in his dead-on humor. Take his description of a typical grocery store catering to discriminating Bobos: "The visitor to Fresh Fields is confronted with a big sign that says 'Organic Items today: 130.' This is like a barometer of virtue. If you came in on a day when only 60 items were organic, you'd feel cheated. But when the number hits the three figures, you can walk through the aisles with moral confidence."

Like any self-respecting Bobo, Brooks wears his erudition lightly and comfortably (not unlike, say, an expedition-weight triple-layer Gore-Tex jacket suitable for a Mount Everest assault but more often seen in the gym). But just because he's funny doesn't mean this is not a serious book. On the contrary, it is one of the more insightful works of social commentary in recent memory. His ideas are sharp, his writing crisp, and he even offers pointed suggestions for putting the considerable Bobo political clout to work. And, unlike the classes that spawned them--the hippies and the yuppies--Brooks insists the Bobos are here to stay: "Today the culture war is over, at least in the realm of the affluent. The centuries-old conflict has been reconciled." All the more reason to pay attention. --Shawn Carkonen


Do you believe that spending $15,000 on a media center is vulgar, but that spending $15,000 on a slate shower stall is a sign that you are at one with the Zenlike rhythms of nature? Do you work for one of those visionary software companies where people come to work wearing hiking boots and glacier glasses, as if a wall of ice were about to come sliding through the parking lot? If so, you might be a Bobo.

In his bestselling work of "comic sociology," David Brooks coins a new word, Bobo, to describe today's upper class -- those who have wed the bourgeois world of capitalist enterprise to the hippie values of the bohemian counterculture. Their hybrid lifestyle is the atmosphere we breathe, and in this witty and serious look at the cultural consequences of the information age, Brooks has defined a new generation.

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