GROWING DOWN

Excerpt

Jaco Hamman’s enormously valuable Growing Down brings a highly therapeutic sense of calm, patience, and sustained attention to a subject that is often a source of anxiety and confusion. The book, Hamman says, “seeks to inform a conversation for those interested in human nature, especially those who are curious about the meaning of the personal rituals and habits we have formed around technologies with small screens” (p. 9). It does so by placing “the psychodynamic thought of Winnicott… in a specific framework that posits certain intelligences needed to thrive and feel alive” (p. 12). These intelligences—Self, Relational, Transitional, Reparative, Playground, and Technological—are examined against the backdrop of the central place devices with small screens have in our culture. …