Description:
Can a woman be smart, empowered, and happy?
Happiness has become a serious business. Where twentieth-century psychology focused on depression and illness, in the new millennium scientists have begun focusing on "positive psychology"--the study of happiness. Ariel Gore first became intrigued by this subject when she discovered that a class on positive psychology was the most popular course on the Harvard campus.
As she read deeper into the topic, she noticed something disturbing: everyone in this happy land was a man. Worse still, some of these new "experts" seemed hell--bent on proving that women with traditional values and bread-winning husbands--those who had made "an effort to expect less," according to one sociologist--were more content than women with feminist values. The more she read, the more she wondered: Can a woman be smart, empowered, and happy?
Determined to find out, Gore began her own "study in living"-- a journey into the feminine history, science, and experience of happiness. Her results, chronicled with humor and curiosity in F*ck Happiness, are by turns fascinating and enriching. A woman's happiness may not come easily and it may not take the forms prescribed by popular culture. But, as Gore discovers, it is not only possible but necessary.
F*ck Happiness is a smart, no--nonsense, uplifting study of the real secret of joy and whether it's truly at odds with the goals of modern women.
Brief description:
Ariel Gore is a journalist, teacher, and author of numerous books on parenting. She is the founding editor-publisher of Hip Mama, an Alternative Press Award-winning publication covering the culture and politics of motherhood. Her memoir Atlas of the Human Heart was a 2004 finalist for the Oregon Book Award. Her anthology Portland Queer: Tales of the Rose City won a Lambda Literary Award in 2010.
Review Quotes:
"[Gore's] research is absorbing, her idea of happiness as a dynamic force is appealing, and her conclusions seem sensible."
-- " Washington Post"