James E. West

“Here is where Taylor locates the most significant shift in the post-’60s West: while ideals of tolerance have always been present in the modern social imaginary, in earlier forms (Locke, the early American republic, etc.) this value was contained and surrounded by other values that were a scaffolding of formation (e.g., the citizen ethic; p. 484). What erodes in the last half century is precisely these limits on individual fulfillment (p. 485). The Place of the Sacred in Our Secular Age What is the “imagined place of the sacred” in a society governed by expressivist individualism (p. 486)? Taylor has already hinted that such a society seems to forge its own “festive” rendition of the sacred”

“There is a story about a little boy from the cattle-herding Fulani people in West Africa. Like children often do on a trip, he asked his father, “How much longer until we get there?” to which his father answered, “Never. We are nomads.””

“Uno spirito di rivolta si diffuse tra noi e, sotto la sua influenza, ogni differenza di cultura e di corporatura fu messa da parte. Ci riunimmo in una banda, chi per spavalderia, chi per gioco e chi per paura: e tra questi ultimi, gli indiani riluttanti che temevano di mostrarsi studiosi o gracilini, c'ero anch'io. Le avventure narrate nella letteratura del Far West erano ben lontane dal mio carattere ma servivano almeno ad aprire le porte dell'evasione.””