Paul Halmos - Solitude and Privacy

The International Library of Sociology

SOLITUDE AND PRIVACY

Founded by KARL MANNHEIM

The International Library of Sociology

SOCIOLOGY OF BEHAVIOUR AND PSYCHOLOGY

In 18 Volumes

SOLITUDE AND PRIVACY

A Study of Social Isolation its Causes and Therapy

by

PAUL HALMOS

With a Foreword by

T. H. MARSHALL

First published in 1952 by

Routledge

Reprinted 1998, 2001 by

Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN

Transferred to Digital Printing 2007

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group

1952 Paul Halmos

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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Solitude and Privacy

ISBN 0-415-17797-9

The Sociology of Behaviour and Psychology: 18 Volumes

ISBN 0-415-17834-7

The International Library of Sociology: 274 Volumes

ISBN 0-415-17838-X

Publishers Note

The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of this reprint but points out that some imperfections in the original may be apparent

The amazingly difficult and vital business of human relationship has been almost laughably underestimated in our epoch.

Everything, even individuality itself, depends on relationship. The light shines only when the circuit is completed. In absolute isolation, I doubt if any individual amounts to much; or if any soul is worth saving, or even having.

My individualism is really an illusion. I am part of the great whole, and I can never escape. But I can deny my connections, break them, and become a fragment. Then I am wretched.

D. H. LAWRENCE

Foreword

D ISCUSSIONS on the state of the world to-day, or on the more domestic aspects of that vast subject, usually revolve round the question, What is wrong with it? Divine discontent may be a healthy stimulus to change, but a deep and continuing sense of failure dries up the springs of endeavour. In order to avoid this sad fate it is necessary to shun the easy road of cheap denunciation and turn to scientific analysis, constructive criticism and positive suggestion. It is along this harder and better path that Dr. Halmos has set himself to travel in this book, in which he passes from the study of basic social forces, through historical and empirical investigations, to the practical problems of reform and therapy.

He has chosen as his theme a matter which lies at the heart of our present troubles, and to which the attention of many people has been attracted in recent years. They have approached it from two opposite directions. Some have started from the observation of individuals who have failed to come fully to terms with life, and whose experiences and behaviour suggest the hypothesis that social isolation is linked with psychological difficulties which may amount to neurosis. The search for the causes of these phenomena leads to the study of our present social structure. The interest of others has been first aroused by mass developments in society itself, and in looking for the effects of these they have been led towards a study of the individual. The former is the natural approach of the psychologist, the latter of the politician and social reformer. The two meet in the recognition of the vital functions of those smaller groups and communities which offer fulfilment of individuality instead of its suppression or distortion, and which can be known and experienced in their entirety.

The author of this book is a social psychologist, and he has carried out a piece of original research designed to test the hypothesis implied . He was able, in spite of the heavy burden of his teaching work, to conduct an investigation among his students at the South-West Essex Technical College, Walthamstow. He is to be congratulated on his enterprise in overcoming the difficulties always present in fieldwork of this kind, and his college also is to be congratulated for having given facilities for a type of investigation which some less enlightened institutions might have condemned as impertinent. A single piece of research on this relatively small scale cannot solve a complex social problem, and one would be doing a disservice to the author by claiming too much for it. Such exaggerated claims provoke destructive criticism, with the result that the real value of what has been done is overlooked. Dr. Halmos has shown that his methods are fruitful and their findings suggestive, and he has penetrated below the facile generalisations of common experience by distinguishing between neurotic typesthe anxious, the depressed and the hystericaland studying the different ways in which each is related to social isolation or participation.