Chapter 6 - Section I and II Summary and Analysis

In chapter six, Boorstin suggests that the greatest challenge Americans are now dealing with is illusion. He continues that we tend consider our problems as existing outside of America.

In section I, Boorstin asserts that America has experienced a move from "ideals to images". He suggests that part of the difficulty in foreign relations is that other countries are exposed to a flood of images that are disconnected from any sense of ideals. Boorstin states, "I suspect we suffer abroad simply because people know America through images. While our enemies profit from the fact that they are known only, or primarily, through their ideals. That is, through their professed goals of perfection."

Boorstin continues that it is not a question of what the images portray, it is more the fact that...