Politics and the Modern Self – Dr Carl Trueman | Sceptic Special Episode

Intellectual historian Dr Carl Trueman on politics, psychology and the ‘modern self’.

In this special episode of the Sceptic, host Laurie Wastell is joined by intellectual historian Dr Carl Trueman, to discuss his book, The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self: Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to Sexual Revolution.

Many of the ideas that drive our politics today are strange by historical standards. Why is such great importance placed on sex, sexuality and identity politics? Why have questions about the family become so ardently politicised? When did our therapeutic society stop believing that “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me”? And why are we so often told that morality and truth are wholly subjective – whatever ‘feels right’?

Across so many domains, the personal has become political. In this conversation with Sceptic host Laurie Wastell, intellectual historian Dr Carl Trueman explains how today’s ‘me, me, me’ social imaginary stems from what he calls The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self, in his book of that title. In an argument encompassing Rousseau, Nietzsche, the Romantic poets and the Sexual Revolution, Dr Trueman sets out how our dominant social ethos of “expressive individualism” arose – and shows what its consequences have been.

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Produced by Richard Eldred.

Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.