scholarly journals Progressive Politics and Humanistic Psychology in the Trump/Coronavirus Era

2020 ◽  
Vol 60 (6) ◽  
pp. 778-791
Author(s):  
Elliot Benjamin

In this article, the author discusses the relationship of progressive politics to humanistic psychology in the Trump/Coronavirus era. The harsh realities of personal fears and severe challenges to our mental health evoked by both the United States presidency of Donald Trump and the coronavirus pandemic are described initially. Then, a number of self-care practices that are consistent with the basic values of humanistic psychology and that we can undertake to help us meet these harsh realities are illustrated. Next, the author describes his own personal engagement and self-care in the world of progressive politics and humanistic psychology in the context of the Resisting Trump movement. The article concludes with the author suggesting that perhaps it may be worthwhile for politically like-minded others to also consider finding ways of merging their progressive politics with humanistic psychology in order to enhance their self-care through these turbulent times in the Trump/Coronavirus era.

2020 ◽  
pp. 002216782097965
Author(s):  
Elliot Benjamin

This article discusses the relationship of humanistic psychology to what the author perceives as the dangerous leadership and rhetoric of United States President Donald Trump, in particular in regard to the severe crisis of the coronavirus pandemic. President Trump’s divisive political and racist rhetoric is described with an emphasis on it quite possibly being linked to a rise in xenophobic violence against Asian Americans, which is related to Asian Americans being unfairly blamed for the spread of the coronavirus. Core values of humanistic psychology consisting of genuine and empathic human relationships, personal growth and transformation, and creativity are offered as antidotes to the severe world of lockdowns, social distancing, and remote interactions becoming the norm that we are currently witnessing in the existential crisis of the coronavirus pandemic. The author utilizes his own experience in the Resisting Trump progressive politics movement as an additional antidote and focuses on the extreme urgency of doing so in our current coronavirus pandemic existential crisis. Finally, the author conveys the importance of working through humanistic psychology cofounder Abraham Maslow’s lower and higher levels simultaneously in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory, to survive the coronavirus pandemic.


2019 ◽  
Vol 58 (2) ◽  
pp. 249-259
Author(s):  
Joseph Acquisto

This essay examines a polemic between two Baudelaire critics of the 1930s, Jean Cassou and Benjamin Fondane, which centered on the relationship of poetry to progressive politics and metaphysics. I argue that a return to Baudelaire's poetry can yield insight into what seems like an impasse in Cassou and Fondane. Baudelaire provides the possibility of realigning metaphysics and politics so that poetry has the potential to become the space in which we can begin to think the two of them together, as opposed to seeing them in unresolvable tension. Or rather, the tension that Baudelaire animates between the two allows us a new way of thinking about the role of esthetics in moments of political crisis. We can in some ways see Baudelaire as responding, avant la lettre, to two of his early twentieth-century readers who correctly perceived his work as the space that breathes a new urgency into the questions of how modern poetry relates to the world from which it springs and in which it intervenes.


2021 ◽  
pp. 203-210
Author(s):  
Jenna Supp-Montgomerie

The telegraph wove its way across the ocean at a time when religion’s role in public life was commonplace. Since then, networks have become more vital to everyday life in easily perceptible ways while religion is considered a less overt part of so-called secular public culture in the United States. The epilogue proposes that the relationship of telegraphic networks to the networks that shape our world today is not causal or continuous but one of resonance in which some elements are amplified and some are damped. The protestant dreams for the telegraph in the nineteenth century—particularly the promise of global unity, the celebration of unprecedented speed and ubiquity, and the fantasy of friction-free communication—reverberate in dreams for the internet and social media today. In cries that the internet makes us all neighbors reverberates the electric pulse of the celebrations of the 1858 cable’s capacity to unite the world in Christian community. And yet, it is not a straight shot from then to now. Some elements have faded, particularly overt religious motifs in imaginaries of technology. The original power of public protestantism in the first network imaginaries continues to resonate today in the primacy of connection.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (04) ◽  
pp. 19-27
Author(s):  
Weixing CHEN

The rise of China has shaken, to some extent, the pillars sustaining the US dominance in the world. Facing structural challenges from China, the United States has responded on three levels: political, strategic and policy. The Donald Trump administration has adopted a hard-line approach while attempting to engage China at the structural level. The China–US relationship is entering uncertain times, and the reconstruction of the relationship could take a decade.


Author(s):  
Sam Gill

The Proper Study of Religion charts an innovative course of development for the academic study of religion by engaging the legacy of Jonathan Z. Smith (1938–2017), perhaps the field’s most influential and important scholar in the last several decades. Smith was the author’s teacher and mentor for fifty years. Their careers coincided with the explosive expansion of the study of religion in secular universities in the United States beginning in the mid-1960s. Building on Smith’s foundational legacy through creative encounters, the book explores an extensive range of engaging topics, including comparison as essential to academic technique and to human knowledge itself; the important role of experience, richly understood, to both academic studies of religion and to religions as lived; play, philosophically understood, as a core dynamic of Smith’s entire program; the relationship of academic document-based studies to the sensory-rich real world of religions; and self-moving as providing a biological and philosophical foundation on which to develop a proper academic study of religion with expansive potential. The foregrounding of human self-movement, new to the study of religion, is informed by the author’s considerable experience as a dancer and student of dancing in cultures around the world. The Proper Study of Religion honors the remarkable and challenging work of an unforgettable giant of a man while also offering critical assessments and innovative ideas in the effort to advance the remarkable legacy of Jonathan Z. Smith.


1940 ◽  
Vol 34 (5) ◽  
pp. 920-935
Author(s):  
Harold F. Gosnell ◽  
Morris H. Cohen

An examination of the relationship of the Democratic percentages in the various states to the Democratic percentage for the nation as a whole during the past forty years shows that several general patterns are discernible. In the north central and northwestern parts of the United States, one of these patterns may be clearly defined. When the country swings in one direction, the states in this region swing with it, but more strongly than the country as a whole. During the twenties, these states were more decidedly Republican than the nation, but during the thirties they became more strongly Democratic. This tendency to shift from one extreme to another is related to the progressive background of these states of which Wisconsin is typical. “Wisconsin,” “La Follette,” “progressive”—for decades these three terms have been almost indissolubly linked in the minds of politically aware observers of the American scene.While Wisconsin has followed the Republican standard in presidential elections almost without exception from 1870 to 1932, it has shown progressive leanings. In 1912, Robert La Follette, Sr's. sulking greatly cut down the Progressive vote, but it was still large enough to split the normal Republican strength and throw the electoral vote to Wilson, and in 1924 the state went overwhelmingly for its own favorite son.


Author(s):  
Koldo San Sebastian

Basques have found their way to many corners of the world, and one of those is the distinctive city of New Orleans in the United States. The relationship of Basques with Louisiana antedates the independence of the United States, and, of course, incorporation of that territory into the American Union. The Basque presence was most evident throughout the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth, when a significant community of Basque mariners resided in New Orleans. This article provides a historical overview of the Basque connection to Louisiana, from the expulsion of the Acadians that sent Basques south, the arrival of Basque mariners, and those relocated Basques from Mexico. General immigrants found their way there as merchants, storekeepers, accountants and blacksmiths and in time a Basque District emerged. There was also a Basque religious presence. The article brings to light the Basque presence.


Author(s):  
Alistair Fox

This chapter examines Merata Mita’s Mauri, the first fiction feature film in the world to be solely written and directed by an indigenous woman, as an example of “Fourth Cinema” – that is, a form of filmmaking that aims to create, produce, and transmit the stories of indigenous people, and in their own image – showing how Mita presents the coming-of-age story of a Māori girl who grows into an understanding of the spiritual dimension of the relationship of her people to the natural world, and to the ancestors who have preceded them. The discussion demonstrates how the film adopts storytelling procedures that reflect a distinctively Māori view of time and are designed to signify the presence of the mauri (or life force) in the Māori world.


Author(s):  
Terence Young ◽  
Alan MacEachern ◽  
Lary Dilsaver

This essay explores the evolving international relationship of the two national park agencies that in 1968 began to offer joint training classes for protected-area managers from around the world. Within the British settler societies that dominated nineteenth century park-making, the United States’ National Park Service (NPS) and Canada’s National Parks Branch were the most closely linked and most frequently cooperative. Contrary to campfire myths and nationalist narratives, however, the relationship was not a one-way flow of information and motivation from the US to Canada. Indeed, the latter boasted a park bureaucracy before the NPS was established. The relationship of the two nations’ park leaders in the half century leading up to 1968 demonstrates the complexity of defining the influences on park management and its diffusion from one country to another.


Author(s):  
Paul J. Bolt ◽  
Sharyl N. Cross

The Conclusion reviews the volume’s major themes. Russia and China have common interests that cement their partnership, and are key players in shaping the international order. Both seek better relations with the West, but on the basis of “mutual respect” and “equality.” While the relationship has grown deeper, particularly since 2014, China and Russia are partners but not allies. Thus, their relationship is marked by burgeoning cooperation, but still areas of potential competition and friction. Russia in particular must deal with China’s growing relative power at the same time that it is isolated from the West. While the Russian–Chinese relationship creates challenges for the United States and Europe and a return of major power rivalry, there is also room for cooperation in the strategic triangle comprising China, Russia, and the West. Looking ahead, the world is in a period of dramatic transition.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document