Longing and Belonging won the 2010 William J. Goode award from the American Sociological Association (ASA) section on the sociology of family, and the 2010 Distinguished Contribution award from the ASA section on children and youth. It also was a finalist for the C. Wright Mills award from the Society for the Study of Social Problems, received an honorable mention for the best book in culture from the ASA's culture section, and has been widely reviewed.
“Whether your specialty is social psychology, family, social inequality, or the sociology of children, this is a book you will want on your bookshelf. You will find yourself assigning it to your students, both graduate and undergraduate, and recommending it to your friends and family. Longing and Belonging is both that compelling and that accessible; first-rate research and engaging prose make this a book that will be read and remembered.”
“Pugh's book... presents its own original analysis and provides an excellent and thought-provoking contribution to scholarship on contemporary childhood, parenting cultures, the work and meaning of caring in families, emotional life, and the consequences of diversity.”
“This book is smart, subtle, detailed, theoretically sophisticated and endlessly compassionate. Simply stunning in its clarity and insight, I have to say I haven't read anything this compelling for a very long time.”
“[R]eading this book didn’t feel like ‘work,’ and I felt inspired by Pugh's example, which demonstrates how good writing, strong narratives, and the intimate details of family life are not diversions from ‘real’ or serious scholarship, but an important way that sociological truths are discovered and communicated.”
“Sociologist Allison Pugh, in her brilliant study Longing and Belonging, succinctly frames [the] conundrum of contemporary child-rearing: ‘If consumer culture is the “enemy’ of good parenting, why do so many parents invite the enemy into their homes?”... Pugh [finds] compelling answers to that question.”
“Many moms and dads find themselves navigating society's veritable obsession with the stuff of parenting—from the Bugaboo strollers to Bratz dolls to the brand-name college education and beyond. Longing and Belonging: Parents, Children, and Consumer Culture by Allison J. Pugh, from the University of California Press, examines this trend and offers some surprising reasons behind parents’ motivation to put their kids' material needs first.”
“Why does buying for children invite so much anxiety and concern? And, knowing what they do, why do parents capitulate? ... Pugh argues that consumer goods form the scrip children use to feel more similar to other children, which allows them to participate more equally with their peers in everyday child culture, to belong.”
Included in “Books of Note” in the American Sociological Association's Culture Newsletter.
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