Book Reveals Insight on America's Youth and Insatiable Love of Competition
NEW YORK, June 4, 2013 /PRNewswire/ — Playing to Win: Raising Children in a Competitive Culture, the first book by Dr. Hilary Levey Friedman, a Harvard sociologist with a smart take on popular culture, parenting and competition, is available to order from all booksellers. It ships September 1.
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Dr. Levey Friedman has expertise in American popular culture, childhood and competition. From competitive afterschool activities and education to reality TV, beauty pageants, and working children, she analyzes how these activities impact individuals and society.
Playing to Win: Raising Children in a Competitive Culture (University of California Press, $29.95 ISBN: 9780520276765) follows children in competitive dance, youth soccer, and chess.
It examines the roots of competitive afterschool activities and their contemporary effects. Playing to Win suggests competitive activities have become proving grounds for success in the tournament of life–especially when it comes to admission to elite universities, and beyond.
Of interest to those interested in childhood and family, education, gender, and inequality, Playing to Win details the structures shaping American children's lives as they learn how to play to win.
William A. Corsaro, author of The Sociology of Childhood, calls Dr. Levey Friedman's book, "Beautifully written, relentlessly insightful, and methodologically innovative, Playing to Win expertly captures the perspectives of parents and children regarding the importance of after school activities for socialization and childhood in contemporary American society. Hilary Levey Freidman has produced a sociological gem."
Her book taps over a decade of research and writing. Dr. Levey Friedman is available to media for print, radio or broadcast opportunities.
About Hilary Levey Friedman
Dr. Levey Friedman grew up near Detroit and graduated magna cum laude with highest honors from Harvard University. Her thesis focused on child beauty pageants. She earned an MPhil from the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences as a Gates Cambridge Scholar at the University of Cambridge. Her dissertation examined fashion and national identity.
Dr. Levey Friedman earned her PhD in Sociology at Princeton University. Dr. Levey Friedman completed a post-doctoral fellowship at Harvard University studying youth sports injuries, supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
Media Contact:
Jackie Lucas, Warner Communications — Email, (978) 255-1159