The Structural Trauma of Western Culture ─ Toward the End of Humanity

This book describes the diverse manifestations of trauma and the ways in which trauma has shaped—and dismantled—our culture. Yochai Ataria describes how we are addicted to trauma and have become both its avid producers and consumers. Consequently, the culture in which we live has become posttraumatic in the deepest sense. This is apparent in the products that have shaped and continue to shape Western culture, ranging from the biblical sacrifice of Isaac to Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now. Ataria exposes the primary attributes of this so-called posttraumatic culture: sacrifice through action, an uncontrolled lust for blood, an inability to speak and describe things in words, a sense of foulness and alienation, emotional death, imperviousness, separation, and an overwhelming sense of exile. 

Yochai Ataria is Senior Lecturer at Tel-Hai College, Israel, and Researcher at the Open University of Israel. He has published a number of theoretical, empirical, and philosophical articles on the topic of trauma, and has co-edited several books.