Rod Janzen is a professor of history and social sciences at Fresno Pacific University. He is the author of The Prairie People: Forgotten Anabaptists.
Description
Contents: Acknowledgments Chapter 1 Synanon and the Image of a Rattlesnake in a Mailbox Chapter 2 In the Beginning: A Cure for Drug Addicts Chapter 3 The Coming of the Squares Chapter 4 Integration and the Game Chapter 5 The Synanon School Chapter 6 Dopefiends and Squares Chapter 7 Communal Art, Re-creation, and a New Religious Identity Chapter 8 Violence and Shaved Heads Chapter 9 The End of Childbirth and Changing Partners Chapter 10 Legal Issues and Materialism Chapter 11 A Period of Darkened Light Chapter 12 The Final Years Chapter 13 Reasons for the Decline Chapter 14 Synanon People on the Outside APPENDIX: The Synanon Philosophy Notes Select Bibliography Index
Authoritative and highly readable. -Jonathan Kirsch, Los Angeles Times A most offbeat and interesting work by an historian well versed in the history of American utopianism. -Choice A remarkable and uniquely American story . . . The research is exhaustive, and this by itself makes the book an invaluable resource for anyone interested in learning about the day-to-day workings of Synanon. -Jessica Warner, Addiction Rod Janzen has pieced together the first retrospective narrative history of the group, tracing both the trajectory of the organization and the contradictory life of Chuck Dederich, its founding guru . . . Janzen is a sympathetic observer who faithfully chronicles Dederich's decline into clinically defined bipolar illness and egomania. -Robert S. Fogarty, Journal of American History Why should we read Janzen's book instead [of other accounts of Synanon]? Because Janzen clearly shows us the mundane ordinariness of Synanon, a utopia without utopian theory or religious or political basis. -Michael Orth, Utopian Studies