Cultivating political and public identity

<p>Throughout the twentieth century everyone from Marxists to economic individualists assumed that social and political activity was driven by the rational pursuit of material gain. Today the fundamental importance of the cultivation and preservation of identity is finally re-emerging. This book explores the rich fabric of speech dress diet and the built environment from which human identity is made. Synthesising methods and ideas from numerous disciplines - including history political science anthropology law and sociology - it presents a picture of human life as more than just a collection of material interests. Its ultimate aim is to show that no human activity is trivial or meaningless that everything counts and 'plumage' matters.<br><br>An electronic edition of this book funded by the London School of Economics and Political Science is freely available under a Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND) licence.</p>