Selfishness and Selflessness : : New Approaches to Understanding Morality / / ed. by Linda L. Layne.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Berghahn Books Complete eBook-Package 2020
• MitwirkendeR: Barker-Benfield, G.J.,; Bodenhorn, Barbara,; Delap, Lucy,; Faircloth, Charlotte,; Graham, Susanna,; Layne, Linda L.,; Mohr, Sebastian,; Strathern, Marilyn,
• HerausgeberIn: Layne, Linda L.,
• Place / Publishing House: New York ;, Oxford : : Berghahn Books, , [2020]; ©2020
• Year of Publication: 2020
• Language: English
• Series: WYSE Series in Social Anthropology ; 10
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (244 p.)

We are said to be suffering a narcissism epidemic when the need for collective action seems more pressing than ever. The traits of Selfishness and selflessness address the ‘proper’ and ‘improper’ relationship between one’s self and others. The work they do during periods of social instability and cultural change is probed in this original, interdisciplinary collection. Contributions range from an examination of how these concepts animated the eighteenth-century anti-slavery campaigners to a dissection of the way middle-class mothers’ experiences illustrate gendered struggles over how much and to whom one is morally obliged to give.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Illustrations, Figures and Tables -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction: Self, Selfish, Selfless -- 1 Taking the Measure of Selfishness and Selflessness in the Early Twenty-First- Century US and UK -- 2 ‘Sentiment Has Struggled with Selfishness’ Selfishness, Sensibility and Gender in the Late Eighteenth-Century British Antislavery Campaign -- 3 Selfless Advocacy? Profeminist Men’s Movements in Late Twentieth-Century Britain -- 4 ‘Doing the Right Thing for My Child’ Self Work and Selflessness in Accounts of British ‘Full-Term’ Breastfeeding Mothers -- 5 Sexism, Separatism and the Rhetoric of Selfishness: Single Mothers by Choice in the US and UK -- 6 Selfish Masturbators? The Experience of Danish Sperm Donors and Alternatives to the Selfish/Selfless Divide -- 7 Inroads into Altruism -- 8 On Being Selfish – Or Not: Explorations of an Idea from the Mountains of Oaxaca and the Alaskan Tundra -- Conclusion. Starting Points: Modest Contributions to the History and Anthropology of Moralities and Ethics -- Index