Dalton Conley's unconventional narrative uses personal anecdotes and current examples to help students understand big ideas. Chapter-opening Paradoxes stimulate sociological thinking. And NEW Practice activities--in text and online--invite readers to "make the familiar strange." Scholarship and examples have been refreshed throughout, especially in a revamped Gender chapter. A wide array of multimedia and assessment tools include award-winning InQuizitive...

Today, American "rugged individualism" is in a fight for its life on two battlegrounds: in the policy realm and in the intellectual world of ideas that may lead to new policies. In this book, the authors look at the political context in which rugged individualism flourishes or declines and offer a balanced assessment of its future prospects. They outline its path from its founding—marked by the Declaration of Independence—to today, focusing on...