The Disappearance of Adulthood

Some years ago I think it was Neil Postman wrote a book entitled, The Disappearance of Childhood, in which, as I recall, he lamented the fact that childhood – which, he explained, is a modern invention – was in danger of being “disappeared.” Children were being made to grow up too fast, and neither they nor the world were prepared for the consequences that might entail. Were he alive today, Mr. Postman might be relieved to know that his fears were perhaps premature. But I’m not sure he’d be happy about what James Davison Hunter describes as the “disappearance of adulthood” in an article in the current issue of The Hedgehog Review (“Wither Adulthood?,