The War Against Boys, Christina Hoff Sommers
The War Against Boys, Christina Hoff Sommers
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The War Against Boys
How Misguided Policies are Harming Our Young Men

Author: Christina Hoff Sommers

Narrator: Coleen Marlo

Unabridged: 7 hr 24 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 05/29/2018


Synopsis

An updated and revised edition of the controversial classic—now more relevant than ever—argues that boys are the ones languishing socially and academically, resulting in staggering social and economic costs.

Girls and women were once second-class citizens in the nation's schools. Americans responded with concerted efforts to give girls and women the attention and assistance that was long overdue. Now, after two major waves of feminism and decades of policy reform, women have made massive strides in education. Today they outperform men in nearly every measure of social, academic, and vocational well-being.

Christina Hoff Sommers contends that it's time to take a hard look at present-day realities and recognize that boys need help. Called "provocative and controversial . . . impassioned and articulate" (The Christian Science Monitor), this edition of The War Against Boys offers a new preface and six radically revised chapters, plus updates on the current status of boys throughout the book.

Sommers argues that the problem of male underachievement is persistent and worsening. Among the new topics Sommers tackles: how the war against boys is harming our economic future, and how boy-averse trends such as the decline of recess and zero-tolerance disciplinary policies have turned our schools into hostile environments for boys. As our schools become more feelings-centered, risk-averse, competition-free, and sedentary, they move further and further from the characteristic needs of boys. She offers realistic, achievable solutions to these problems that include boy-friendly pedagogy, character and vocational education, and the choice of single-sex classrooms.

The War Against Boys is an incisive, rigorous, and heartfelt argument in favor of recognizing and confronting a new reality: boys are languishing in education and the price of continued neglect is economically and socially prohibitive.

About Christina Hoff Sommers

Christina Hoff Sommers is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C. She has a PhD in philosophy from Brandeis University and was formerly a professor of philosophy at Clark University. Sommers has written for numerous publications and is the author of Who Stole Feminism?: How Women Have Betrayed Women. She is married with two sons and lives in Chevy Chase, Maryland.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Bradley on December 10, 2019

It's always an eye-opener when a really good look at statistics shows some glaring errors in widely held assumptions. It's even more of an eye opener to realize that some of your own carefully held assumptions are wrong. This book, published in 2001, seems kind of political and reactionary, but that......more

Goodreads review by Trish on March 24, 2020

I'm a woman. As such, I'd like true equality between the sexes. However, I despise most feminism, at least the more modern variety. Most is militant and entirely illogical in its maniacal desire to bring disadvantage to men as a form of revenge. So while I want women to have the same opportunities a......more

Goodreads review by Dale on July 20, 2012

This teacher comments: One of the best non-fiction books I've read all year! I graduated from Indiana University in 1990 - just as the 'girls are fragile' movement was gaining momentum. I was taught the 'facts' that Sommers refers to in numerous in-services (for all of you non-teachers, many teacher......more

Goodreads review by Christina on February 16, 2014

It was clear to me from several years of volunteering in my son's elementary school that girls and boys are simply and clearly different. Yet the director of the literacy program at the Redwood City Library insisted to me—expressing a belief that too many people have—that boys are girls are identica......more