Daniel J. Boorstin: Event

Daniel J. Boorstin was American historian. Explore interesting quotes on event.

Daniel J. Boorstin: 78 quotes 4 likes

“Pseudo‑events do, of course, increase our illusion of grasp on the world, what some have called the American illusion of omnipotence. Perhaps, we come to think, the world’s problems can really be settled by “statements,” by “Summit” meetings, by a competition of “prestige,” by overshadowing images, and by political quiz shows.”

Daniel J. Boorstin

Source: The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America (1961), p. 44.

World , Problem , Thinking

“Pseudo‑events spawn other pseudo‑events in geometric progression. This is partly because every kind of pseudo-event (being planned) tends to become ritualized, with a protocol and a rigidity all its own. As each type of pseudo-event acquires this rigidity, pressures arise to produce other, derivative, forms of pseudo‑event which are more fluid, more tantalizing, and more interestingly ambiguous.”

Daniel J. Boorstin

Source: The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America (1961), p. 33.

“The news leak is a pseudo‑event par excellence. In its origin and growth, the leak illustrates another axiom of the world of pseudo‑events: pseudo‑events produce more pseudo‑events.”

Daniel J. Boorstin

Source: The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America (1961), p. 31.

World

“IN THE last half century a larger and larger proportion of our experience, of what we read and see and hear, has come to consist of pseudo‑events. We expect more of them and we are given more of them. They flood our consciousness. Their multiplication has gone on in the United States at a faster rate than elsewhere. Even the rate of increase is increasing every day. This is true of the world of education, of consumption, and of personal relations.”

Daniel J. Boorstin

Source: The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America (1961), p. 12.

World , Education , Reading , Personality

“These pseudo‑events which flood our consciousness must be distinguished from propaganda. The two do have some characteristics in common. But our peculiar problems come from the fact that pseudo‑events are in some respects the opposite of the propaganda which rules totalitarian countries. Propaganda — as prescribed, say, by Hitler in Mein Kampf — is information intentionally biased. Its effect depends primarily on its emotional appeal. While a pseudo‑event is an ambiguous truth, propaganda is an appealing falsehood. Pseudo‑events thrive on our honest desire to be informed, to have “all the facts,” and even to have more facts than there really are.”

Daniel J. Boorstin

Source: The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America (1961), p. 34.

Truth , Problem , Dependency , Country

“In the age of pseudo‑events it is less the artificial simplification than the artificial complication of experience that confuses us. Whenever in the public mind a pseudo‑event competes for attention with a spontaneous event in the same field, the pseudo‑event will tend to dominate. What happens on television will overshadow what happens off television.”

Daniel J. Boorstin

Source: The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America (1961), p. 39.

Age