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The Tender Cut: Inside the Hidden World of Self-Injury
Choice's Outstanding Academic Title list for 2013
2013 Honorable Mention for the Distinguished Book Award presented by the Midwest Sociological Society
Honorable Mention for the Charles H. Cooley Award for Outstanding Book from the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction
Illuminates the misunderstood meaning of self-injury in the 21st century
Cutting, burning, branding, and bone-breaking are all types of self-injury, or the deliberate, non-suicidal destruction of one’s own body tissue, a practice that emerged from obscurity in the 1990s and spread dramatically as a typical behavior among adolescents. Long considered a suicidal gesture, The Tender Cut argues instead that self-injury is often a coping mechanism, a form of teenage angst, an expression of group membership, and a type of rebellion, converting unbearable emotional pain into manageable physical pain.
Based on the largest, qualitative, non-clinical population of self-injurers ever gathered, noted ethnographers Patricia and Peter Adler draw on 150 interviews with self-injurers from all over the world, along with 30,000-40,000 internet posts in chat rooms and communiqués. Their 10-year longitudinal research follows the practice of self-injury from its early days when people engaged in it alone and did not know others, to the present, where a subculture has formed via cyberspace that shares similar norms, values, lore, vocabulary, and interests. An important portrait of a troubling behavior, The Tender Cut illuminates the meaning of self-injury in the 21st century, its effects on current and former users, and its future as a practice for self-discovery or a cry for help.
2013 Honorable Mention for the Distinguished Book Award presented by the Midwest Sociological Society
Honorable Mention for the Charles H. Cooley Award for Outstanding Book from the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction
Illuminates the misunderstood meaning of self-injury in the 21st century
Cutting, burning, branding, and bone-breaking are all types of self-injury, or the deliberate, non-suicidal destruction of one’s own body tissue, a practice that emerged from obscurity in the 1990s and spread dramatically as a typical behavior among adolescents. Long considered a suicidal gesture, The Tender Cut argues instead that self-injury is often a coping mechanism, a form of teenage angst, an expression of group membership, and a type of rebellion, converting unbearable emotional pain into manageable physical pain.
Based on the largest, qualitative, non-clinical population of self-injurers ever gathered, noted ethnographers Patricia and Peter Adler draw on 150 interviews with self-injurers from all over the world, along with 30,000-40,000 internet posts in chat rooms and communiqués. Their 10-year longitudinal research follows the practice of self-injury from its early days when people engaged in it alone and did not know others, to the present, where a subculture has formed via cyberspace that shares similar norms, values, lore, vocabulary, and interests. An important portrait of a troubling behavior, The Tender Cut illuminates the meaning of self-injury in the 21st century, its effects on current and former users, and its future as a practice for self-discovery or a cry for help.
264 pages, Hardcover
First published August 22, 2011
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
September 17, 2014
By far one of the best, most thorough books on self-injury that I've read. It is, as some other reviews noted, highly sociological. It can get a bit dry; it reads like the research report that it is. It is geared toward academics rather than the general public. Overall, though, it was very well-researched, well-organized and well-written. But as a forewarning, the book would be very triggering if you were/are involved in self-injury. Even the cover picture (on the edition I read, anyway) is triggering, for some. Take that into consideration before reading. Definitely worth reading in general.
October 2, 2017
Read this for class. A very well-structured sociological dissection of self-injury. The book compartmentalised its ideas and themes into digestible sections. Language was also simple so it made it overall easy to read. Gotta say, some of the things discussed in here are pretty morbid. It was refreshing seeing self-injury explored within a sociological framework as opposed to a psychological, mental disorder way. It gave voices to the people who participated in this practice and debunked a lot of assumptions I previously had from popular media about people who self-injure (such as self-injury being phase, the types of people who self-injured).
April 22, 2021
I had to read this book for my sociology of mental illness class in college. It was a great read. As a former self-harmer the begining of the book was hard to get through. It was gritty but truthful. I was only 2 yrs 'clean' from SI when I read it so i had to keep putting it down and fight the urge to relapse, (I didn't. 5 years clean this May 2021) But it also showed me that I wasn't alone. That there were other people out there who did what I did. It made me feel less like a freak. I had never met or read someone that really truly understood where I was coming from and for once in my life I could relate to someone.
May 6, 2015
If I could give this a negative number is ratings, I would. This book does not show you "inside" the life of a self-harmer. It practically promotes self harm and gives it the title of a "fad". IT'S NOT A FAD. People need to realize how much emotional pain a person needs to be in to take a blade or a burning piece of metal to their skin.
January 29, 2016
The idea of self injury makes me queesy, so it was hard to finish this book, but considering the number of people who self-injure (about 2% of the population, according to some estimates), it's something to be more educated about. The authors did a good job exploring the experience itself, the rationales behind it, and the history.
March 27, 2023
Despite it being 12 years since this research was conducted and published, there were quite a few eye-opening things discussed within the book. I say this even as someone who participated in SI and knew of other people doing so in different ways - I had no idea there were so many methods people utilized or the reasons behind it.
May 23, 2020
Truths that will give you shivers - or at least for I, who has yet to dip into the world for which this book speaks and therefore probably never will.
December 23, 2025
Read for a college class. The book was really interesting and I think warping the testimonies into the book was a great idea bc there are too many people who just don’t believe/understand
May 17, 2012
Anecdotal stories on why people hurt themselves. There were a number of reasons stated why people would cut or burn themselves. It seems mostly about internal distress but also because in some cases it feels good.
August 18, 2013
A good look at the practicalities of self harm (cutting)... A bit of an eye opener in places, very useful. Thank you to the authors for putting this out there. They are not going to be making millions out of this publication, but was very worthwhile reading...
March 17, 2015
"As a result, it spread rapidly among populations vulnerable to this mystique, changing from being something that was generally self-invented by individuals in private to a socially learned and contagious behavior."
October 24, 2016
For someone with experience there's nothing new in this work, nothing ground-breaking or important. It's not an entertaining thing to read either.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews