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Description

In “The End of Public Culture” Richard Sennett discusses issues with intimacy and how as a cultural idea it is a curse and not a blessing (Sennett, 1976: 259-268). Sennett argues that beliefs, aspirations and myths of the modern life even though it appears to be humane are dangerous in reality. Sennett has identified that the reigning belief of the modern times is that the closeness between persons is moral good and the aspiration is to develop individual personality through experiences of closeness and warmth with others. And the myth according to Sennett is that the evils of the society can be understood as evils of personality, alienation and coldness. The ideology of intimacy according to Sennett is the sum of the above three. Sennett believes that this ideology of intimacy defines the humanitarian spirit of society with gods, and it is this humanitarian spirit that Sennett tries to question through his work “Fall of Public Man” (Sennett, 1976: 259-268).