Clearly the cultural pressure to achieve a unique self is old, strong, and not unique to hipsters, so why did the authenticity drive spin out of control after CE 2000? One possible reason is that the hundreds of studies on authenticity in tourism and subcultures have also been read and in many cases sponsored by business thinkers who directly... See more

I’m extremely wary of the cult of contemporary self-making, and the fact that it’s become an expected part of life in the attention economy for middle-class workers.

From the college essay – the first time many of us are required to tell a selling story of ourselves in the service of social capital – to the dating website to Twitter or Instagram,... See more

These are the run clubs and swim clubs with very robustly branded websites for some reason, websites that greet you with full-width videos of delighted people being very sweaty together. New ventures for “group conversation” or exclusive social spaces or curated clubs with sign-up flows and membership levels that evoke the rigor of a bank account... See more