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Monoculture: How One Story Is Changing Everything
Monoculture: How One Story Is Changing Everything
Monoculture: How One Story Is Changing Everything
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Monoculture: How One Story Is Changing Everything

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

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Winner of the George Orwell Award. One of The Atlantic's best books of the year.

As human beings, we’ve always told stories: stories about who we are, where we come from, and where we’re going. Now imagine that one of those stories is taking over the others, narrowing our diversity and creating a monoculture. Because of the rise of the economic story, six areas of your world — your work, your relationships with others and the environment, your community, your physical and spiritual health, your education, and your creativity — are changing, or have already changed, in subtle and not-so-subtle ways. And because how you think shapes how you act, the monoculture isn’t just changing your mind — it’s changing your life.

In Monoculture, F.S. Michaels draws on extensive research and makes surprising connections among disciplines to take a big-picture look at how one story is changing everything. Her research and writing have been supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Killam Trusts, and regional and municipal arts councils. Michaels has an MBA and completed five years of PhD studies in Organizational Analysis. She lives in British Columbia, Canada.

"A single lucid narrative that's bound to first make you somewhat uncomfortable and insecure, then give you the kind of pause from which you can step back and move forward with more autonomy, authenticity and mindfulness than ever." - The Atlantic

"A thin, enrapturing gem. It's accessible, sensible--exactly the sort of book that should have (and still could + should!) take off and create a tiny little dent in books." - Kenyon Review

"A smart and realistic guide to first recognizing the monoculture and the challenges of transcending its limitations." - Maria Popova, BrainPickings.org

"I found myself reading non-stop, underlining like crazy...an astute explanation about what I've been feeling recently, something I couldn't put my finger on...[Michaels] writes in clear, energetic prose that's thoughtful, engaging and unforced. She defines and analyzes without judgment or insistence...a breath of fresh air." - NPR

"...a singularly brilliant and accessible analysis of some of the fundamental assumptions and driving principles of our time." - Comment Magazine

"5 stars: The cause and effect of our world is more surprising than you'd think. With intriguing notions about the driving ideas of stories in every shape of our life, "Monoculture" is an incredibly fascinating way about how the mind works and today's consumer culture." - Midwest Book Review

"If you just read one book this year, read this one." - BuriedInPrint.com

LanguageEnglish
PublisherF.S. Michaels
Release dateMay 4, 2011
ISBN9780986853814
Monoculture: How One Story Is Changing Everything
Author

F.S. Michaels

Winner of the 2011 George Orwell Award for outstanding contributions to the critical analysis of public discourse. One of The Atlantic's Top 11 psychology books of 2011. In Monoculture, FS Michaels draws on extensive research and makes surprising connections among disciplines to take a big-picture look at how one story is changing everything. Her research and writing have been supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Killam Trusts, and regional and municipal arts councils. Michaels has an MBA, and lives and writes in British Columbia.

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Rating: 3.445945972972973 out of 5 stars
3.5/5

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  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    An interesting idea given utterly superficial treatment. You'd think a book that's nearly a third references and recommended reading would be more substantive. Virtually the only passages worth taking note of were the epigrams and extended quotes from other works.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Canadian researcher F.S. Michaels decries and documents the way economic rationalism has distorted the social realities of public libraries, education, medicine, religion and so on.She demonstrates the cost when human beings are turned into consumers and our interactions became a market-place. The human values and the diversity of values, turn into a commodity. Efficiency and maximising the (financial) bottom line become all that matter.Opting out of this dominant story, the monoculture, is not an effective way to fight back. Michaels advocates creating “parallel structures" that interact with the market place, but which also allow for the growth of human values. She cites the Slow Food movement, pattern language in architecture, and Nonviolent Communication as three parallel structures which restore our humanity.The generosity with which Michaels is distributing this E-book is also an example of paralleling market structures.Much of what Michaels writes is not new. What is valuable, though, is the way she has gathered together data from a variety of fields to show how the economic story has colonised each one. It is also creditable that the hope she offers through her concept of "'parallel structures” is modest. This lack of a grand design may in fact be the most realistic antidote to the poison of the economic Monoculture.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Monoculture by F.S. Michaels looks at how the unwritten and unspoken dominant culture of an area can shape the lives of the people within that culture. She argues that the current monoculture of the developed world is money — or more broadly the worth of things and actions.Michaels outlines her argument around these key areas: work, relationship with others, relationships with the world, education, physical health, mental health, communities, and creativity. Against each of these areas of the human condition she tests her thesis.A monoculture, as it is unwritten, doesn't mean the same thing for everyone. It doesn't turn people into sheep or lemmings, but it can affect lives through government policies and personal choices. Enlightenment, though, can help a person or an entire community break free from the invisible, assumed bonds of the monoculture.It's a short, quick and fascinating book. I've since passed along my review copy to my friends to read.I received a copy from the author for review.
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    I tried to read this book several times. I feel the concept is sound and there is a good point being made, but it is being made in such a way that I was bored to tears. I just could not make it through to the end.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Oh, the frustration: I want to recommend this book highly for its ideas while acknowledging that the writing isn't the greatest. Try it anyway: it's thin. The monoculture Michaels is discussing is an economic one: the idea that everything in life (religion, nature, education, medicine, etc.) should be viewed in terms of its profitability, its cost to us, whether it's efficient, and so on. The author provides many examples (yay!), but in spelling them out, they come across as repetitive. View this book as an introduction to the topic and I hope it encourages others, and the author herself, to explore it in more depth in future works.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I found the book to be somewhat repetitive. In fact, at one point, I thought that I had accidentally pressed a button taking me back to a previous chapter. The book covers an interesting concept and is written in a relatively engaging style, but I wish there were more substance to it. Furthermore, linear takes on history and culture are rarely accurate and usually represent a rather oversimplified view -- something that at least somewhat applies to this book.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This was a small sized book that is filled with useful information that made me think about the world around me and how we value our lives and institutions.The authors premise is that we are at risk of valuing everything using the same cookie cutter approach: Is this (family, institution, organization) efficient, cost effective and economical? This is a mammoth undertaking requiring thinking out of the box on a subject that most of us are too close to see. Institutions that used to be ‘not for profit’ and for the great good of society are now expected to show their worth in explicit financial terms. Institutions that were meant to be free(er) of corporate influence such as libraries and educational institutions are now more directly influenced due to their requirement to fundraise and evaluate the financial benefit programs. You need only look at the cutbacks to libraries in Canada to see the effects of valuing everything at only one level. The author argues that this ‘monoculture’ is spreading and affecting the ways we evaluate our careers, living arrangements, and even our families. If everything is valued economically, we loose the ability to describe things as having value otherwise (community, religious values, charity, etc). The author has set out chapters describing how this change is affecting various areas including the arts, education, religion (Who are now competing for ‘customers’) creativity, etc.The first chapter does jump right in without adequately describing the premise, but once you catch up it is a very interesting book. Missed is the impact of advertising where materialistic and food attitudes are brainwashed into people. Although this book was written by a Canadian author, some of the chapters have a distinct American point of view (e.g. the chapter on medical care, etc).What this book did stress to me was the importance of valuing some institutions outside of a purely ‘economic’ perspective. The last chapter describes a few of the alternative perspectives including the ‘Slow Food Movement’ which I have been very interested in.

    1 person found this helpful

  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I found the book to be somewhat repetitive. In fact, at one point, I thought that I had accidentally pressed a button taking me back to a previous chapter. The book covers an interesting concept and is written in a relatively engaging style, but I wish there were more substance to it. Furthermore, linear takes on history and culture are rarely accurate and usually represent a rather oversimplified view -- something that at least somewhat applies to this book.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Monoculture's premise is that the "economic story" has become the dominant paradigm in our culture to the point, where is has become so embedded we don't really question it. Monoculture spends the majority of the book making its case for how this story has pervaded different facets of our lives, and finishes with a chapter on what might be done to change this.Monoculture covers interesting and important topics and points out the interconnectedness of these issues under the umbrella theme of the "economic story". However I found the book to be simultaneously too light weight in its broad generalizing of the topic but too heavy in its prose. By this I mean that the writing has a very academic feel to it, like it is a thesis. It is missing the style and flow that really well written non-fiction has, which manages to capture and hold the reader. That is not to say it is badly written, but that it is more dry than I was expecting.I also found that Monoculture was a bit too general and light in its treatment of the topic. I think that if the author had provided more examples, including more global examples, this would have not only strengthened her thesis but would provide more tangible points of interest.Despite my criticisms, Monoculture makes a convincing case that the "economic story" is something that we should question, or at least realize is there and acknowledge the affects it has on our lives.
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    The first chapter, “What is a monoculture?” reads well and introduces the concept of monoculture, the underlying story that shapes our lives and behaviours without our being aware of it. The introduction presents this interesting concept and prepares the reader for an exploration of the monoculture that shapes our lives.I’m sorry to say, Chapter 1 is the highlight of the book. In Chapters 2 to 9 the reader is treated to rambling discussions about how monoculture can be seen in various areas of life and how events have affected the underlying story of monoculture over history brining us to the situation where the predominant story is economics.In Chapter 10 the monoculture effect is summarised and in Chapter 11 we are told there is another way, and how we can use our awareness of the monoculture to live in a fashion that is not totally subservient to the dominant monoculture.Comprehensive notes and a broad bibliography present all the corroborating evidence supporting the facts in the book and the conclusions drawn.I was left with the impression that this book is the result of someone’s qualitative research paper on monoculture. While it may present everything necessary to earn the qualification it was prepared for it does not present everything that is necessary to make it an interesting, useful book that people will use to improve their lives.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This is one of my personal favorites of the books I have read in the last few years, for several reasons. First of all, it is one of those books that helps you to step back and take a good look at your own beliefs and narratives about how the world works and why, jolting you out of your usual thinking and presenting another perspective. Some of these ideas hit home - ideas I was vaguely aware of but unable to articulate, while others are totally new. The author posits that the market economy is what basically drives every area of our lives. Of course this makes sense; if we can't put food on the table, we won't be around to consider anything else - that is about survival so easily becomes our main narrative. However, this narrative has gone way beyond survival and need into our crazy consumer driven lives. The breadth of this book is another reason for the five stars - the author addresses how this narrative effects most areas of our lives including the music we listen to, the art we come to value, obviously the clothes we wear, our medical care, our religion, our relationships with family members and friends, etc. - much more! I think many of us are aware of these things without realizing the extent to which we have lost choice in many of these areas. For example, it is common knowledge what has happened to the music industry with monopolies such as Sony determining what we listen to, as well as other media corporations determining which version of the news we are offered. I have always found it interesting to watch religions shape themselves in such a way as to receive government aid through non-profit status also. These things and many more are addressed in this book. Another reason for the five stars: yes there are ideas for solutions presented. We already know many of them and this reading is helping me to stick to my own values more often. For example, I'm putting more effort into supporting local businesses, co-ops, local musicians and artists, etc. The author talks about a parallel narrative, along the lines of "Being the change" we want to see in the world. It is easy when addressing some of these topics to feel overwhelmed and hopeless - not so with this book - it IS helping me to be that change, as small as it may be!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    "Monoculture" by F. S Michaels is two books in one. Firstly, it provides an account of the stories we tell ourselves. Michaels argues that it is through this story that we create the characters, contexts and plots to live our lives. Secondly, it tells the dominance of a particular story called "economics" that our modern society is reproducing in all facets of life. What Michaels does is show how pervasive this story is, how it moves beyond marketsto become deeply embedded in our self concepts and drivers. It is a deceptive book: at first glance the chatty second person style, which serves to make the book very acessible, makes it feel more like a self-help book than a scholarly work. However closer insepection revealed a well researched, smart and cleverly argued text. This is a "big picture" approach and consequently there are some jumps in the story and a few unanswered questions. However overall it is a fascinating and gripping account of the dominance of the economic paradigm in our lives. My only real gripe with this book is the limited space for dealing with resistance and alternatives. Compared to the rest of the book this section was very short and undertheorised. The examples she gives are all useful and inspiring, but there are many other stories that counter the dominant narrative that could have been included (eg social innovation spaces, cooperatives, intentional communities etc). It would have been helpful to situate this story into a metahistorical perspective (see for example the work of Solimowsky) and to reflect on the movement of metanarratives over time. Each story contains tis own counter story and it would have been helpful to relect more upon this. However to anyone keen to think about who we are and how we live our lives I would recommend this book as definite food for thought.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I found the idea of the "economic story" presented by the author to be very good and appropriate. This is not a new idea but it is one that will make the reader think about why we make the choices we make. I agree with the author, when she states that the economic story does shape the way people currently think, act and feel in our society. Education, health, security, family, all seem to take a back seat if we are not able to justify it economically. I thought this quote sums it up, "Call a thing immoral or ugly, soul-destroying or a degradation of man, a peril to the peace of the world or to the well-being of future generation: as long as you have not shown it to be 'uneconomic' you have not really questioned its right to exist, grow and prosper"
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Monoculture is an example of a compelling idea failed by a flawed execution. The text never actually presents why we should believe that we are currently existing within an economic story that dictates our cultural norms - the "monoculture" is simply presented as a given, over an over again. The "proof" seems to be the middle chapters of the book, where past societal norms are compared with current societal norms - where "society" as described seems limited to the characteristics of white, often male, middle-class North America. I did not find this to be "proof" so much as a juxtaposition of cherry-picked facts and observations from two periods in time, interesting but not solid.In these comparisons, the past is presented in glowing, golden-age terms, for the given theme (work, relationships, nature, etc), while the present is presented in drab, soul-crushing tones. What the text actually argues is that living inside the economic story monoculture is a bad thing, using this tonal disparity between the descriptions of past and present as the weight-bearing portion of the argument. One such comparison that struck me was the description of past home life, with husband working and wife staying home to look after the kids and home, compared with present home life where both husband and wife work. The argument came when the text stated that markets came into existence to fill the duties associated with keeping house - as if gardeners, housekeepers, and nannies didn't exist as professions before the economic story, which is patently untrue. I believe I can see what argument was being reached for - that the market for these services has grown up and flourished because there is a void to fill that wasn't there in the past - but that's not what the text says.After that, no matter how much I might agree that work, and long work hours, are crowding out a growing population of people's ability to have a well-cared-for home life, I agree despite Monoculture's presented argument, not because of it. And I must dismiss all arguments presented in the book, because I know they are biased, flawed, and emotionally manipulative, no matter how compelling I find the thesis.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I enjoyed reading this book, but did wonder if we are really more of a monoculture now than in the age of Religion or the age of Science? Or, is it just that the author is not comfortable with the economic story that she believes underlies our lives and influences our actions.Ms. Michaels does make the case that the economic story is pervasive, especially in North America. And she does show how a mindset can be both subtle and powerful at the same time. Any time spent listening to “talk radio” seems to reinforce Ms. Michaels’ assertion that the prevailing value in society is free market capitalism. But there are many people and organizations that operate outside of this story; far more than the three examples provided in the book. Random acts of kindness occur every day, love is still blind, and the Internet is providing a forum for creativity that doesn’t need to make money.This book is focused and clearly written. But, to me, the real question for this kind of book is whether it makes a compelling argument for change. I don’t think it does. I doubt anyone will change their views or behaviour as a result of reading it. Those of us who see education as a public good will continue to do so; those who think of higher learning as simply a means to employment will continue to argue against education subsidies. The conclusion of the book was a disappointment. If the economic monoculture is really dangerous, we need to compel our politicians and other leaders to act. We need more than a few words encouraging people to think about their actions. At the end, the author failed to come up with recommendations that matched the “weight” of the described problem.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    ah-hah... I just found out that the author is Canadian... this explains a lot about the tone of the book. I'm not exactly sure how to explain what I mean, but there is a Canadian flavor to this book, even though the content is American (i.e. the references to health care processes are based on the U.S. version of healthcare, not the Canadian pseudo-socialist version).It actually reads more like a journal article (complete with many pages of references) than a book - and is short like a journal article too. It seems to be well-researched and, for the most part, well-supported by other research.I found it interesting to see just how pervasive the economic model of the world is, at least in North America, and how this "dollar-value" to everything lowers our quality of life, even if it might raise our standard of living (for those lucky ones among us anyway). The author did offer some alternative models but the bulk of the book is spent looking at how our modern world has applied economic assessments to everything, even things that traditionally don't/shouldn't have an economic component (such as our health and well-being).All in all, it was an interesting and enlightening read even while it was sort of depressing to see how nearly every part of our world has been boiled down into its value in dollars and cents.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This book makes a pretty good case for the idea that our culture has at the present time only one background story left, and that's an economic one. The case that this used to be different is weaker - she does show that there used to be different stories, but not really that they were any less monolithic. As a matter of fact, the stories she tells about how things were before the economic story seem a bit arbitrary sometimes. Why the breadwinner model, for instance?Still, it is good to see how something as subtle as the background story really influences the situation, and she also has some ideas about how to free yourself from this story.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    The term “monoculture” comes from agriculture. It is the practice of growing a single crop on a farm (or in an area) to the exclusion of all others. While this can have economic benefits, it is also a high risk strategy – since a single pest infestation or virus can destroy the entire output, and ultimately damaging – as the soil becomes depleted in the nutrients required for the single crop to grow. The term has been adapted to other areas, its wider use in biology refers to populations or ecosystems with poor genetic or bio-diversity. In Information Technology, it refers to a site running the same hardware and/or software (as is becoming increasingly common) which raises the risk of attack from malware or even security penetration.In this book, “monoculture” means the practice of free market capitalism. Michaels’ thesis is that the universal application of the “story” of the free market (and thus focus on profits,and economic value to the exclusion of other values) is bad for society. It’s hard to disagree with her, certainly it seems that the free market is being applied to things it ought not to be.Not content with this assertion that public utilities and social needs are being driven into market based models despite their unsuitability, Michaels spends the first half of the book listing examples (one per chapter) in great detail. This gives the book a somewhat repetitive feel, and runs the risk of scaring away the less determined reader from the book’s conclusions.And what are the book’s conclusions? That this is not the only way, and that people are actively seeking to subvert the “monoculture” (more examples, this time of how groups are trying to “get back” to basics). The book offers no real answers other than the, rather strange, claim that the monoculture is “...not the whole story, no matter how much it tries to be.” (which kind of undermines its status as a monoculture).So, it is, in essence a self-help book for those yearning for the “good old days” when we didn’t just care about money for everything. “See, here are other people who agree with you, and you should do what they do in your own way.”To sum up, the book isn’t really about monoculture, it’s about caring for things other than money. It doesn’t really address how this is a political problem, and needs to be dealt with on a political scale, but just reassures the reader that it’s OK to think it’s wrong, and tells them to go and do their own thing.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Monoculture is the idea that economics is the new foundation for everything we do. F.S. Michaels presents a logical argument that everything humans do, from education to food, from art and culture to scince is grounded in economics, and why we complete these activities is being re-written. Although I don;t believe that certain things should be done via economics, the argument (and reality) have convinced me. The book read like a textbook, although it's not a bad thing.  
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I'm rating this a 4 based on the important point it makes well, even though I don't feel like the resolution is nearly as sharp. The main point is that we now see our world through the framework of economic markets. Markets work for allocating resources, but the concept distorts the meaning of other things such as art, religion, education, and community. I found this insight well explained through a consistent philosophy and compellkng examples. It ends with two chapters that might better have been omitted, if not sharpened; however, the epilogue is actually a suitable conclusion. The author convinced me to look at the world differently than I did before (as someone with extremely strong grounding in markets).
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    F. S. Michaels makes a clear, straightforward case that economics has become the governing pattern that is invisibly shaping all aspects of North American culture. Economics is unconsciously shaping how we think about work, interpersonal relationships, nature, community, health, spirituality, education, and creativity. This economic monoculture is shaping how we think, act, and live. Michaels clearly explains how the economic worldview shapes our lives. She illustrates with examples the consequences of our economic monoculture. She also provides guidance about how to break out of the constraints of a monoculture to live a more genuine life. She does not advocate having to start a world movement. Her suggestions focus on what we can do as individuals in choosing to live a more satisfying and diversified life. She points to people who have moved beyond the confines of the monoculture. She is also realistic about the difficulties of living a life that embraces more than the dominant economic story.Michaels stays focused and to the point in her writing. There is no fluff contained in the pages of this book. “Monoculture” is a short, interesting, informative, provocative read.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Free LibraryThing Early Reviewer book. A short attack on the “economic” story of human existence, where we’re all individualistic rational utility maximizers and therefore we/the people with the power to make decisions about how to allocate resources ignore the long-term effects of our decisions on the environment, the economy, our relationships with other people, and so on. I’m not sure I’m the right audience, since everything seemed perfectly obvious to me (if you think of education as solely a way to get a better job, of course you devalue its other effects and simultaneously are more willing to offload the costs to the individual student who is after all the only one who will benefit from that education). But I wasn’t sure the book could persuade someone that the “economic” story was wrong, since many pointy-headed liberals will simply respond that a lot of current decisions are bad when you do utility maximization the right way. There were some suggestions for what you as an individual could do to fight the destructive selfishness of our current culture, and I do think that individual choices matter, but in the end without political action it’s hard to see how that will change things.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Canadian researcher F.S. Michaels decries and documents the way economic rationalism has distorted the social realities of public libraries, education, medicine, religion and so on.She demonstrates the cost when human beings are turned into consumers and our interactions became a market-place. The human values and the diversity of values, turn into a commodity. Efficiency and maximising the (financial) bottom line become all that matter.Opting out of this dominant story, the monoculture, is not an effective way to fight back. Michaels advocates creating “parallel structures" that interact with the market place, but which also allow for the growth of human values. She cites the Slow Food movement, pattern language in architecture, and Nonviolent Communication as three parallel structures which restore our humanity.The generosity with which Michaels is distributing this E-book is also an example of paralleling market structures.Much of what Michaels writes is not new. What is valuable, though, is the way she has gathered together data from a variety of fields to show how the economic story has colonised each one. It is also creditable that the hope she offers through her concept of "'parallel structures” is modest. This lack of a grand design may in fact be the most realistic antidote to the poison of the economic Monoculture.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    The main idea in this book is that there is a loss of value diversity in different areas of life, and that changes how we live. The book has a wide application to a wide variety of readers b/c it looks at changing trends in work, education, communities, creativity and the art, spirituality, healthcare and government. I found the book very approachable, well-written, and accessible. Lots of good examples, good synthesis of complex ideas, and I ended up doing lots of "hmmm, that's interesting." I was inspired by the parallel lives section. Overall, the book reads well and really teaches a lot to the reader - and the length is just right, not too long and not too short.

Book preview

Monoculture - F.S. Michaels

What Others are Saying About Monoculture: How One Story is Changing Everything

Winner of the 2011 George Orwell Award for outstanding contributions to the critical analysis of public discourse.

One of The Atlantic's Top 11 Psychology Books of 2011.

I found myself reading non-stop, underlining like crazy…an astute explanation about what I’ve been feeling recently, something I couldn’t put my finger on. [Michaels] writes in clear, energetic prose that’s thoughtful, engaging and unforced. She defines and analyzes without judgment or insistence…a breath of fresh air… - NPR Ohio

…a singularly brilliant and accessible analysis of some of the fundamental assumptions and driving principles of our time. - Comment Magazine  

Neither a dreary observation of all the ways in which our economic monoculture has thwarted our ability to live life fully and authentically nor a blindly optimistic sticking-it-to-the-man kumbaya, Michaels offers a smart and realistic guide to first recognizing the monoculture and the challenges of transcending its limitations, then considering ways in which we, as sentient and autonomous individuals, can move past its confines to live a more authentic life within a broader spectrum of human values. - The Atlantic

5 stars: The cause and effect of our world is more surprising than you’d think. With intriguing notions about the driving ideas of stories in every shape of our life, Monoculture is an incredibly fascinating way about how the mind works and today’s consumer culture. - Midwest Book Review

If you just read one book this year, read this one…You won’t just be considering the narrative of the culture in which you live, you’ll be considering the everyday choices you make in your life. But the best part of the story is that the author affords you the opportunity to pick up your pen and demand a rewrite…A mind-altering work. - BuriedInPrint blog

A single lucid narrative that’s bound to first make you somewhat uncomfortable and insecure, then give you the kind of pause from which you can step back and move forward with more autonomy, authenticity and mindfulness than ever. - Maria Popova, BrainPickings.org

A thin, enrapturing gem. It’s accessible, sensible—exactly the sort of book that should have (and still could + should!) take off and create a tiny little dent in books. - The Kenyon Review

MONOCULTURE

How One Story is Changing Everything

by F.S. Michaels

Copyright 2011 F.S. Michaels

Published by Red Clover Press at Smashwords

This book is also available in print at bookstores and online retailers.

CONTENTS

Epigraph

1. What Is a Monoculture?

2. The One Story

3. Your Work

4. Your Relationships With Others and the Natural World

5. Your Community

6. Your Physical and Spiritual Health

7. Your Education

8. Your Creativity

9. The Monoculture Effect

10. Finding Another Way

Epilogue

Notes

Bibliography

About the Author

Copyright

It is easy to forget how mysterious and mighty stories are. They do their work in silence, invisibly. They work with all the internal materials of the mind and self. They become part of you while changing you. Beware the stories you read or tell; subtly, at night, beneath the waters of consciousness, they are altering your world.

—Ben Okri

CHAPTER 1: WHAT IS A MONOCULTURE?

There is no such thing as just a story. A story is always charged with meaning...And we can be sure that if we know a story well enough to tell it, it carries meaning for us.

—Robert Fulford

The history of how we think and act, said twentieth-century philosopher Isaiah Berlin, is, for the most part, a history of dominant ideas. Some subject rises to the top of our awareness, grabs hold of our imagination for a generation or two, and shapes our entire lives. If you look at any civilization, Berlin said, you will find a particular pattern of life that shows up again and again, that rules the age. Because of that pattern, certain ideas become popular and others fall out of favor. If you can isolate the governing pattern that a culture obeys, he believed, you can explain and understand the world that shapes how people think, feel and act at a distinct time in history.¹

The governing pattern that a culture obeys is a master story — one narrative in society that takes over the others, shrinking diversity and forming a monoculture. When you’re inside a master story at a particular time in history, you tend to accept its definition of reality. You unconsciously believe and act on certain things, and disbelieve and fail to act on other things. That’s the power of the monoculture; it’s able to direct us without us knowing too much about it.

Over time, the monoculture evolves into a nearly invisible foundation that structures and shapes our lives, giving us our sense of how the world works. It shapes our ideas about what’s normal and what we can expect from life. It channels our lives in a certain direction, setting out strict boundaries that we unconsciously learn to live inside. It teaches us to fear and distrust other stories; other stories challenge the monoculture simply by existing, by representing alternate possibilities.

As a result, learning to see the monoculture can leave us feeling threatened and anxious because the process exposes our foundations, outlines the why of why we live the way we do. Still, if we fail to understand how the monoculture shapes our lives and our world, we’re at risk of making decisions day after day without ever really understanding how our choices are being predetermined, without understanding how the monoculture even shapes what we think our options are. Without a clear understanding of the monoculture, it’s hard to understand the trajectory of your own life. But once you know what shared beliefs and assumptions make up the governing pattern at this point in history, you can discover the consequences of the monoculture and decide if that’s how you really want to live.

Monocultures and their master stories rise and fall with the times. By the seventeenth century, for example, the master story revolved around science, machines and mathematics. Developments in fields like biology, anatomy, physics, chemistry and astronomy were early harbingers of modern science. People began to believe that the nature of the world could be discovered through mathematics, that physical laws directed the behavior of all bodies, and that living creatures could be systematically catalogued in relation to one another. Life was understood as a series of questions with knowable answers, and the world became methodical and precise. A scientific monoculture was created.

That scientific monoculture was radically different from the religious monoculture that preceded it. If you had lived in sixteenth century Europe, a hundred years earlier, you would almost certainly have understood your life through the master story of religion and superstition. People lived surrounded by angels and demons. When Galileo contradicted the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church by claiming that the sun and not the Earth was at the center of the solar system, he was accused of heresy and sentenced to house arrest for the rest of his life. Excommunication from the church and the damning of your eternal soul was a real threat, and you could literally pay for your sins to guarantee yourself a short stay in purgatory. Religion was the zeitgeist, the spirit of the age.

A monoculture doesn’t mean that everyone believes exactly the same thing or acts in exactly the same way, but that we end up sharing key beliefs and assumptions that direct our lives. Because a monoculture is mostly left unarticulated until it has been displaced years later, we learn its boundaries by trial and error. We somehow come to know how the master story goes, though no one tells us exactly what the story is or what its rules are. We develop a strong sense of what’s expected of us at work, and in our families and communities — even if we sometimes choose not to meet those expectations. We usually don’t ask ourselves where those expectations came from in the first place. They just exist — or they do until we find ourselves wishing things were different somehow, though we can’t say exactly what we would change, or how.

Monocultures, though overwhelmingly persuasive and pervasive, aren’t inescapable. In the end, the human experience always diverges from the monoculture and its master story, because our humanity is never as one-dimensional as the master story says it is. The human experience is always wider and deeper than a single narrative, and over time, we become hungry for something the monoculture isn’t speaking to and isn’t giving us — can’t give us. Once you know what the monoculture looks like, you can decide whether it serves a useful purpose in your life, or whether you want to transcend it and live in a wider spectrum of human values instead — to know it so you can leave it behind.

In our time, in the early decades of the twenty-first century, the monoculture isn’t about science, machines and mathematics, or about religion and superstition. In our time, the monoculture is economic. Because of the rise of the economic story, six areas of your world are changing — or have already changed — in subtle and not-so-subtle ways. How you think about your work, your relationships with others and the natural world, your community, your physical and spiritual health, your education, and your creativity are being shaped by economic values and assumptions.

And because how you think shapes how you act, the monoculture that arises as a result isn’t just changing your mind — it’s changing your life.

CHAPTER 2: THE ONE STORY

Generally, the familiar, precisely because it is familiar, is not known.

—Hegel

The universe, said poet Muriel Rukeyser, is made of stories, not of atoms. Stories are what we are made of too. We use them to capture our yesterdays and secure our tomorrows. Stories tell us what we can expect from other people, and from life. There are as many ways to tell them as there are people in the world, and as many stories waiting to be told. Those that resonate deeply stay with us all our lives. A good story, well told, makes you realize you were yearning for something you had no name for, something you didn’t even know you wanted.

In one sense, we are constantly telling stories. We live them every day, playing everything from minor to major roles in other people’s lives. Somehow we take all of these different narratives we’re part of and weave them into something that helps us understand why things are the way they are. As storytellers, we make sense of our lives through our own point of view, giving meaning to one thing or another according to how we each make sense of the world. How do we do it? How do we make sense of where we come from and where we are going? What do all of these stories mean? What importance do they have to the story of us together, here and now, that is slowly being written?

Answers to questions like these help us build our personal mythology, the hidden structure that supports our storytelling. Psychoanalyst June Singer says, Personal myths are not what you think they are. They are not false beliefs. They are not the stories you tell yourself to explain your circumstances and behavior. Your personal mythology is, rather, the vibrant infrastructure that informs your life, whether or not you are aware of it. Consciously and unconsciously, you live by your mythology.¹

Your personal mythology — that infrastructure that informs your life — doesn’t exist in a vacuum; it’s surrounded by the overarching stories of our culture. Those larger cultural stories are rooted in areas of activity in society that are interconnected but distinct, areas represented by political, religious, economic, aesthetic, intellectual and relational pursuits. We take these cultural stories so for granted that we’re hardly conscious of them. We simply accept them as reality — the way it is and the way it always has been. The stories stay unarticulated for the most part, something we generally subscribe to but probably couldn’t explain, and something to not bother thinking too much about in a world where there is plenty to hold our attention.

When one of these cultural stories becomes dominant, a master story emerges. That master story begins to change the other cultural stories, and as that larger context begins to shift, your personal mythology — that vibrant infrastructure that informs your life — shifts along with it. A new governing pattern evolves. A monoculture begins to form.

So how do we learn to see that monoculture? How do we learn to see something as pervasive, invisible, and life-forming as air? We can see what effect the monoculture has when we look at what we tell each other about how we and the world ought to be. What is life about? What stories are we told and what stories do we live by?

In these early decades of the twenty-first century, the master story is economic; economic beliefs, values and assumptions are shaping how we think, feel, and act. The beliefs, values and assumptions that make up the economic story aren’t inherently right or wrong; they’re just a single perspective on the nature of reality. In a monoculture though, that single perspective becomes so engrained as the only reasonable reality that we begin to forget our other stories, and fail to see the monoculture in its totality, never mind question it. We accept it as true simply because we’ve heard its story so often and live immersed in it day after day. The extent to which we accept that monoculture unquestioningly and live by its tenets is the extent to which our lives are unconsciously being shaped by it.

The first assumption most people make when they learn the monoculture is economic is that the master story is all about money — how to get it, make more of it, spend it, grow it, or keep it, whether that looks like consumerism, commercialism, or materialism. But that’s only true of the economic monoculture at a surface level. Though the monoculture naturally embodies issues surrounding money, the economic story represents a much more nuanced and insidious tapestry

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