Date:
Location:
Seeing Others: How Recognition Works and How It Can Heal a Divided World
Michèle Lamont, Professor of Sociology and of African and African American Studies and the Robert I. Goldman Professor of European Studies at Harvard University
Acclaimed Harvard sociologist, Michèle Lamont, makes the case for reexamining what we value to prioritize recognition—the quest for respect—in an age that has been defined by growing inequality and the obsolescence of the American dream. In this capstone work, Lamont unpacks the power of recognition—rendering others as visible and valued—by drawing on nearly forty years of research and new interviews with young adults, and with cultural icons and change agents who intentionally practice recognition—from Nikole Hannah Jones and Cornel West to Michael Schur and Roxane Gay. She shows how new narratives are essential for everyone to feel respect and assert their dignity. Decades of neoliberalism have negatively impacted our sense of self-worth, up and down the income ladder, just as the American dream has become out of reach for most people. By prioritizing material and professional success, we have judged ourselves and others in terms of self-reliance, competition, and diplomas. The foregrounding of these attributes of the upper-middle class in our values system feeds into the marginalization of workers, people of color, LGBTQIA+ individuals, and minority groups. The solution, Lamont argues, is to shift our focus towards what we have in common while actively working to recognize the diverse ways one can live a life. Building on Lamont’s lifetime of expertise and revelatory connections between broad-ranging issues, Seeing Others delivers realistic sources of hope: By reducing stigma, we put change within reach. Just as Robert Putnam’s Bowling Alone did for a previous generation, Seeing Others strikes at the heart of our modern struggles and illuminates an inclusive path forward with new ways for understanding our world.
Michèle Lamont is Professor of Sociology and of African and African American Studies and the Robert I. Goldman Professor of European Studies at Harvard University. An influential cultural sociologist who studies boundaries and inequality, she has tackled topics such as dignity, respect, stigma, racism, class and racial boundaries, and how we evaluate social worth across societies. Her most recent book is Seeing Others: How Recognition Works and How It Can Heal a Divided World (forthcoming with Simon and Schuster, September 2023). Her other books include: Money, Morals, and Manners: The Culture of the French and the American Upper-Middle Class (1992), The Dignity of Working Men: Morality and the Boundaries of Race, Class, and Immigration (2000), How Professors Think: Inside the Curious World of Academic Judgment (2009), as well as the coauthored Getting Respect: Responding to Stigma and Discrimination in the United States, Brazil and Israel (2016). After studying with Pierre Bourdieu and others in Paris in the early eighties, Lamont emerged as a pioneer in cultural and comparative sociology, helping to define these fields as we know them today. Her many awards include the C. Wright Mills Award from the Society for the Study of Social Problems for The Dignity of Working Men, the 2014 Guttenberg Award, the 2017 Erasmus Prize, and honorary doctorates from six countries. She served as President of the American Sociological Association in 2016, was a Carnegie Fellow in 2021-2022, and was inducted into the American Academy of Arts & Sciences in 2023. She co-chaired the advisory board to the 2022 United Nations Human Development Report, “Uncertain Times, Unsettled Lives: Shaping our Future in a World in Transformation.”
