A Misfit's Manifesto: The Sociological Memoir of a Rock & Roll Heart - Softcover

Gaines, Professor Donna

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0813540542 ISBN 13: 9780813540542

Publisher: Rutgers University Press, 2007

Synopsis

Dubbed the Margaret Mead of heavy metal, Donna Gaines is a walking, talking oxymoron, a turnpike intellectual. A Misfit's Manifesto is the story of her wild-in-the-burbs odyssey-from overweight yeshiva girl to savvy street-punk sociologist. Isolated, angry, and depressed through most of her adolescence and early adulthood, she found truth and beauty in the least likely places. Wandering the craggy terrain of Rockaway Beach, Queens, Gaines embarked upon a path to enlightenment involving sex, drugs, rock & roll, sociology, cosmetology, True Love, the occult, tattoos, science fiction, pizza, guns, comic books, and surfing-by Web and by sea.

For Gaines, dignity, joy, and communion came not from family, organized religion, or mandatory schooling, but in the sound of doo-wop, surf music, acid rock, then punk, trash metal, and hardcore. "For most of my life," she writes, "music was the only way to connect that wouldn't eventually kill me."

Through all the ripped nights of binge-drinking, pill-popping, and nightclubbing, Gaines became an acclaimed author, scholar, and expert on teen suicide. In an age of conformity and censorship, she defends popular culture as a powerful spiritual force-a vibrant, valid connection to God. A meditation on alienation and engagement, this memoir is an outcast's journey into the black-hole sun, where Divine love and light are found-even in Ramones songs.

This edition includes a scholarly introduction that considers memoir as a sociological as well as literary genre, as a reflexive means of understanding the self in social context while nurturing a sociological imagination. Social memoir, Gaines argues, illuminates problems like alienation, marginality, addiction, and suicide, while making sociology more user-friendly and public. Now this work of dazzling originality and iconoclasm that has inspired misfits everywhere is an ideal text for classroom use, making complex social theory exciting, timely, and relevant for students.

About this title

From the Inside Flap:

Donna Gaines is the Margaret Mead of heavy metal, a turnpike intellectual, a walking, talking oxymoron. A Misfit's Manifesto is the story of her wild-in-the-burbs odyssey--from yeshiva girl to street-punk sociologist. The only child of a glamorous big-band vocalist, Donna had three fathers, including the "Kishka King of Brooklyn." Fat, lonely, and depressed, she found truth and beauty in the least likely places. Wandering the craggy terrain of Rockaway Beach, Queens, Donna embarked upon a path to enlightenment: sex, drugs, rock & roll, sociology, cosmetology, True Love, the occult, tattoos, science fiction, pizza, guns, comic books, and surfing--by Web or by sea. "Popular culture, my unholy redeemer," she proclaims.
It was Donna's consuming love of the "profane world" that gave her the courage to be, buffering her against relentless sorrow and self-loathing. Dignity, joy, and communion came not from family, organized religion, or mandatory schooling, but in the sound of doo-wop, then surf music, hard rock, punk, and grindcore. "For most of my life," she writes, "music was the only way to connect that wouldn't eventually kill me."
Through all the ripped nights of binge-drinking in rock clubs, Donna Gaines became an acclaimed author and an expert on teen suicide. In an age of conformity and censorship, Dr. Gaines defends popular culture as a powerful spiritual force, a vibrant, valid connection to God. This is an outcast's journey into the black-hole sun, where Divine love and light are found--even in Ramones songs. Donna Gaines has written a work of dazzling originality and iconoclasm, an inspiration for misfits everywhere.

About the Author:

Donna Gaines is the author of the bestselling book Teenage Wasteland: Suburbia's Dead End Kids. Her work has appeared in Rolling Stone, Ms., the Village Voice, Salon, Spin, and Newsday and numerous scholarly venues.

About this edition

• Publisher: Rutgers University Press
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 0813540542
• ISBN 13: 9780813540542
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 416