collective wisdom

       

If anyone can do a friend of mine a favour I'd be grateful. They're trying to find the one book that y'all would recommend on the following topics:

1. Celebrity in modern culture
2. Prestige, or class
3. Psychology of succes/recognition/status
4. The idea of membership/belonging

Any thoughts please add them to the comments, and if this works I'd be happy to ask questions for other people too.

thanks in advance

nuff respect to spell with flickr

            

Comments

[Ju]

"Status Anxiety" by Alain de Botton is interesting. It´s 2 parts:
1) 5 factors/issues that cause the anxiety
2) 5 factors/issues that cure the anxiety

It´s not a psychology book, and it´s not a deep / definitive book on modern behavior regarding the search for social recognition. But it is cool.

And I read an article the other day that may also interest you (on celebrity culture / celebrities as brands).
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=610423

[Lisa]

Queen bees and wannabees by Rosalind Wiseman. She looks at a bunch of things that affect membership of teenage girl cliques. It's quite interesting, don;t know if it hits all the things you list, but worth a flick.

[Corentin]

Hi Russell,

'Illusions of Immortality: A Psychology of Fame and Celebrity' by David giles

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0333754506/qid=1149363691/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl/026-0033151-9920467

and The Psychology of Interpersonal Behaviour by Michael Argyle

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0140172742/qid=1149363897/sr=1-3/ref=sr_1_2_3/026-0033151-9920467

Hope it helps

[Colman]

'Conspicuous Consumption' by Thorstein Veblen touches on all of them (some indirectly).

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0141023988/qid=1149414341/sr=8-2/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i2_xgl/026-5655573-2092403

[Johanna]

Snobbery: The American Version is a great social commentary on this type of thing. It's by Joseph Epstein and can be found here on Amazon - http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0618340734/sr=8-1/qid=1149439983/ref=pd_bbs_1/002-4069169-5958414?%5Fencoding=UTF8

[hidden persuader]

Yes, I would recomend too the Status Anxiety" by Alain de Botton and .. err perhaps "The Challenge of Affluence" from
Avner Offer.

[rodrigo]

While it doesnt meet the criteria for #1 (celebrity), I would reccomend 'Babbit' by Sinclair Lewis. A great book that touches on many of these issues if you can stomach some broad caricatures.