Character Assassination Throughout the Ages, Hardcover by Icks, Martijn (EDT)...
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Character Assassination Throughout the Ages, Hardcover by Icks, Martijn (EDT).... Character Assassination Throughout the Ages, Hardcover by Icks, Martijn (EDT); Shiraev, Eric (EDT), ISBN 1137397861, ISBN-13 9781137397867, Like New Used, Free shipping in the US Though it is a collection of papers in response to a conference on the topic of character assassination, this book is organized to be useful as a textbook on the subject. Here, character is defined in its historical sense as the combination of visible qualities and behaviors that socially define a person's morality, not as a general synonym for personality. Character assassination is the deliberate destruction of an individual's reputation in this area. The editors define it not in terms of whether the accusations are true or false; they must be intentional, public, and the public must see the individual as morally indefensible as a result. Therefore the topic is a social one (what does a public see as socially unacceptable, especially in a public figure?) rather than a personal or ethical one (what is immoral?). Th begins with a full overview of the topic, from the perspective of political psychology and how the field can be useful to historians. The following four sections go through examples from ancient Rome to the early modern period. While some other cultural examples are mentioned, the focus is on the Western world, including how the West saw non-Western cultures (a chapter on Christian false biographies of Muhammed is included). The last section deals with the present era; a chapter deals with the history of character attacks in US presidential politics, and organizes them by general type, and two chapters look at parallel issues in China and Czechoslovakia under Communism. Annotation ©2014 Ringgold, Inc., Portland, OR ()
