Word: gorer
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...those with nostalgia for a simpler past, here is a word of comfort. Anthropologist Geoffrey Gorer studied the few peaceful human tribes and discovered one common characteristic: sex roles were not polarized. Differences of dress and occupation were at a minimum. Society, in other words, was not using sexual blackmail as a way of getting women to do cheap labor, or men to be aggressive...
...expected a landmark trial that would probe the right to dissent under the First Amendment, examining the morality and legality of political conscience exercised as a conspiracy to encourage defiance of the law. Not least among the reporters was Jessica Mitford. A voluble supporter of liberal causes and noted gorer of sacred cows, she arrived in Boston with her pro-Spock sympathies clearly showing, and she joined the defendants in hoping that the legality of the Viet Nam war could be exactingly explored. The hope was dashed when Judge Francis Ford quickly ruled that any discussion...
...decade ago, Anthropologist Geoffrey Gorer wrote a much reprinted article on "the pornography of death." Gorer's point, also made by German Theologian Helmuth Thielicke, is that death is coming to have the same position in modern life and literature that sex had in Victorian times. Some support for the theory is provided by the current movie The Loved One, which turns death into a slapstick dirty joke...
...wailing and expressing grief and loneliness. What effect does this have on us psychologically? It may mean that we have to mourn covertly, by subterfuge-perhaps in various degrees of depression, perhaps in mad flights of activity, perhaps in booze." In his latest book, Death, Grief and Mourning, Anthropologist Gorer warns that abandonment of the traditional forms of mourning results in "callousness, irrational preoccupation with and fear of death, and vandalism...
Whether or not such conclusions are justified, the take-it-in-stride attitude can make things difficult. Gorer cites his brother's widow, a New Englander, whose emotional reticence, combined with that of her British friends, led her to eschew any outward signs of mourning. As a result, "she let herself be, almost literally, eaten up with grief, sinking into a deep and long-lasting depression." Many a widow invited to a party "to take her mind off things" has embarrassed herself and her hostess by a flood of tears at the height of the festivities. On occasion, Gorer...