Philip Slater
Philip Slater | |
|---|---|
Philip Slater in 1980 | |
| Born | May 15, 1927 |
| Died | June 20, 2013 (aged 86) |
| Occupations | Social critic, writer, playwright, actor, academic |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | Harvard University (AB 1950, PhD 1955) |
| Thesis | Psychological Factors in Role Specialization (1955) |
| Academic work | |
| Era | Counterculture of the 1960s |
| Discipline | Sociology |
| Sub-discipline | Sociology of small groups, sociology of knowledge, educational sociology |
| Institutions | Harvard University, Brandeis University, University of California, Santa Cruz |
| Main interests | Drugs, mental illness, aging, family, psychoanalytic theory |
| Notable works | The Pursuit of Loneliness (1970) |
Philip Elliot Slater (May 15, 1927 – June 20, 2013) was an American sociologist, social critic, author, and playwright. He was the author of 12 books and more than 20 plays, and was a blogger for The Huffington Post. Formerly a professor and chair of the sociology department at Brandeis, he left academia at the age of 44 after writing The Pursuit of Loneliness (1970), a critique of American culture.
After the book's success, Slater moved to Santa Cruz permanently, got rid of most of his possessions, and pursued a life of voluntary simplicity. He continued to write non-fiction, but also began writing fiction and plays. He started acting and became artistic director of his local theatre. Throughout his career as an academic and as an author, Slater was primarily concerned with the topic of democracy and how individualism, money, and authoritarianism posed threats to its continued existence.