Great philosophers such as Kierkegaard, Nietzsche and Sartre have clearly been preoccupied by the possibility of authenticity. In this study, Jacob Golomb looks closely at the literature and writings of these philosophers in his analysis of their ethics. Golomb's writings shows his passionate commitment to the quest for the authenticity - particularly in our climate of post-modern scepticism. He argues that existentialism is all the more pertinent and relevant today when set against the general disillusionment which characterises the late twentieth century. This book is invaluable reading for those who have been fascinated by figures like Camus's Meursault, Sartre's Matthieu and Nietzsche's Zarathustra.

Seeking Authenticity provides reflection, insight, and humor, packaged into a series of essays and short stories. The essays integrate philosophy from the past and produce a spark for contemplation over timeless fundamental values. This writing aims to interrogate and explore an eminent buzzword of our era: Authenticity.Do you spend your time well? Are you honest? Grateful? Resilient? Responsible? Do you have purpose? How do these questions and ideas lead to authenticity in your own life? Explorations into these values are expressed in parallel with the story of a near year-long surfing and hiking adventure from British Columbia, Canada to Queensland, Australia, with stops down the West Coast of the United States and Hawaii. These stories encompass sometimes poetic, sometimes sarcastic, yet always honest, expression.

Everywhere we hear talk of decline, of a world that was better once, maybe fifty years ago, maybe centuries ago, but certainly before modernity drew us along its dubious path. While some lament the slide of Western culture into relativism and nihilism and others celebrate the trend as a liberating sort of progress, Charles Taylor calls on us to face the moral and political crises of our time, and to make the most of modernity's challenges. "The great merit of Taylor's brief, non-technical, powerful book...is the vigor with which he restates the point which Hegel (and later Dewey) urged against Rousseau and Kant: that we are only individuals in so far as we are social... Being authentic, being faithful to ourselves, is being faithful to something which was produced in collaboration with a lot of other people... The core of Taylor's argument is a vigorous and entirely successful criticism of two intertwined bad ideas: that you are wonderful just because you are you, and that 'respect for difference' requires you to respect every human being, and every human culture--no matter how vicious or stupid." --Richard Rorty, London Review of Books

Volume 2 of the Research in Careers series focuses on the search for authenticity in one’s career. Although there has been growing interest in the topic within the popular press, relatively little academic research has been completed on authenticity and careers. Researchers are still refining the concept of authenticity and are just beginning to investigate how it influences the enactment of careers in today’s turbulent career landscape. This volume offers the first organized effort on the topic. This volume contains seven chapters which examine the search for authenticity derived from the Kaleidoscope Career Model (Mainiero & Sullivan, 2006). Chapters 1 and 2 present a review of the literature and an in-depth analysis of the construct of authenticity. Chapter 1 offers a new lens to view career authenticity based on two dimensions of self-awareness and adaptability. Chapter 2 uses two case studies to define how individuals are authentic in their career. Chapters 3 and 4 examine the authenticity of individuals in different career stages, with Chapter 3 examining recent college graduates and Chapter 4 examining mid to late stage careerists. Chapters 5, 6 and 7 focus on the interplay between social interactions and career authenticity. Chapter 5 offers a process model that traces how, through negotiation, a person’s identities shape and are shaped by relationships with others, leading to the enactment of an authentic career. Chapter 6 explores how individuals remain authentic in their career while negotiating the conflicting expectations of multiple interest groups. Chapter 7 examines the complex relationships among career authenticity, political behaviors, and strain.

Contrived. Disingenuous. Phony. Inauthentic. Do your customers use any of these words to describe what you sell—or how you sell it? If so, welcome to the club. Inundated by fakes and sophisticated counterfeits, people increasingly see the world in terms of real or fake. They would rather buy something real from someone genuine rather than something fake from some phony. When deciding to buy, consumers judge an offering's (and a company's) authenticity as much as—if not more than—price, quality, and availability. In Authenticity, James H. Gilmore and B. Joseph Pine II argue that to trounce rivals companies must grasp, manage, and excel at rendering authenticity. Through examples from a wide array of industries as well as government, nonprofit, education, and religious sectors, the authors show how to manage customers' perception of authenticity by: recognizing how businesses "fake it;" appealing to the five different genres of authenticity; charting how to be "true to self" and what you say you are; and crafting and implementing business strategies for rendering authenticity. The first to explore what authenticity really means for businesses and how companies can approach it both thoughtfully and thoroughly, this book is a must-read for any organization seeking to fulfill consumers' intensifying demand for the real deal.

Authenticity is a notion much debated, among discussants as diverse as cultural theorists and art dealers, music critics and tour operators. The desire to find and somehow capture or protect the “authentic” narrative, art object, or ceremonial dance is hardly new. In this masterful examination of German and American folklore studies from the eighteenth century to the present, Regina Bendix demonstrates that the longing for authenticity remains deeply implicated in scholarly approaches to cultural analysis. Searches for authenticity, Bendix contends, have been a constant companion to the feelings of loss inherent in modernization, forever upholding a belief in a pristine yet endangered cultural essence and fueling cultural nationalism worldwide. Beginning with precursors of Herder and Emerson and the “discovery” of the authentic in expressive culture and literature, she traces the different, albeit intertwined, histories of German Volkskunde and American folklore studies. A Swiss native educated in American folklore programs, Bendix moves effortlessly between the two traditions, demonstrating how the notion of authenticity was used not only to foster national causes, but also to lay the foundations for categories of documentation and analysis within the nascent field of folklore studies. Bendix shows that, in an increasingly transcultural world, where Zulu singers back up Paul Simon and where indigenous artists seek copyright for their traditional crafts, the politics of authenticity mingles with the forces of the market. Arguing against the dichotomies implied in the very idea of authenticity, she underscores the emptiness of efforts to distinguish between folklore and fakelore, between echt and ersatz.

One of Canada's hippest, smartest cultural critics takes on the West's defining value. We live in a world increasingly dominated by the fake, the prepackaged, the artificial: fast food, scripted reality TV shows, Facebook "friends," and fraudulent memoirs. But people everywhere are demanding the exact opposite, heralding "authenticity" as the cure for isolated individualism and shallow consumerism. Restaurants promote the authenticity of their cuisine, while condo developers promote authentic loft living and book reviewers regularly praise the authenticity of a new writer's voice. International bestselling author Andrew Potter brilliantly unpacks our modern obsession with authenticity. In this perceptive and thought-provoking blend of pop culture, history, and philosophy, he finds that far from serving as a refuge from modern living, the search for authenticity often creates the very problems it's meant to solve.