The Anatomy of Disgust

The unique genius of Professor Miller's work lies not in his ability to give new information to the reader. Indeed, most of his observations are instantly recognized by any perceptive reader as being things he or she already knew about the world. The genius of The Anatomy of Disgust, as with his other works, is his ability to recognize fundamental truths that most people never think about at all, or would prefer not to, and to organize these truths into a coherent system by which human behavior can be analyze and understood.I strongly recommend this book!

One more "I loved it!" review? Yes, and here's goes. Mr. Miller does a marvelous job, writing in laid back but eminently readable prose that is also judiciously scholarly, describing, explaining, or just tossing up speculations about a culturally modified body of reaction that provokes the "Ee~oo,gross!". The subject has been handled before, obviously, judging by all the references he makes to the various studies, some recondite, some classic, including Mary Douglas' and Freud's. The book reads like an intimate seminar, with the author citing immediate examples from his own life, and casually but appropriately pointing out things done by his own children. Miller makes it clear from the get go that his study is necessarily restricted to the study of the phenomenon as shaped and defined by the culture and class to which he belongs: WASP with a roundedly informed grasp of his own tradition and values. In that sense, the book makes no claim to be universal, a disclaimer that stands out as an act of virtue in contrast to much of disgustingly pompous academic sweepers out there. Nonetheless, the author does manage to bowl pretty well, getting a strike here and there in terms of observation concerning the qualities that, for all practical purposes, are universally recognized to be those of the disgusting. I use the term 'universal' as it applies today, what with globalization and all. Yes, coprophagy (eating of feces) is indulged in by some for thrills, but I doubt anyone practices drooling saliva into a cup and then drinking it back up. The author suggests that it may not be too much to credit the invisible structure of human social evolution to the distancing of two points, YUCK and YUM. The culturo-environmental determination of the length between those two points may very well contain much of what it takes to delimit a culture's potential for art, science, and language as well. The book contains what everyone already knows (too well!) but never bothered to articulate for him/herself. There is much here to delight the inner pre-pubescent in us all, but it is a serious book, nevertheless. After all, in the grown-up world, it is not the gooey, slimy stuff so much as the ethical defect in the form of gooey, slimy character and corresponding actions that make us think,"EE~oo! Gross!" A nice companion to Sloterdijk's The Critique of Cynical Reason.

I can think of no greater praise to confer upon such a wonderfully erudite, wryly penetrating, and rigorously eloquent book than that Nietzsche's approval of it as a genuine contribution to the genealogy of morality can be readily imagined. Indeed, like his previous, and comparably trenchant, work, "Humiliation," his "Anatomy" deploys etymology, anthropology, social- and individual psychology, history, and inspired scrutiny of 'heroic' literature in order to, as Nietzsche characterized the task in 1887, "decipher" from "what has been documented, what is really ascertainable, what has really existed... the whole long hieroglyphic text... of humanity's moral past."

An absolute winner. Miller has unflinchingly analysed the disgusting and found a complex universe of overlapping emotions and instincts. Almost every sentence is worth reading out at dinner parties. The index alone is worth the price. Buy the book.

Readers will enjoy expanded coverage including Dr. Disgust..Paul Rozin,PhD....in Psychology Today, Jan/Feb '98. ..almost too much to stomach