Republic of Outsiders: The Power of Amateurs, Dreamers, and Rebels

This “groundbreaking study of the increasing influence of cultural outsiders” (The Philadelphia Inquirer) is “at once an ode to the underrepresented and a reporting tour de force” (The Writer). Alissa Quart, “one of the smartest cultural interpreters of her generation” (Susan Cain, author of Quiet), introduces us to those who have created new ways to keep themselves sane, fulfilled, and, on occasion, paid.

Republic of Outsiders is the story of Americans who, freed of middlemen and armed with new technology, are able to make their unusual ideas go viral and disrupt the status quo. They include amateur filmmakers who crowdsource their work, scientists developing artificial meat, neurodiverse activists, and “alternative” bankers. These outsiders create and package new identities (a process Quart dubs “identity innovation”). They push the boundaries of who they—and we—can be.

Excerpted in O Magazine and The Nation, given a starred review in Publishers Weekly, chosen as a Flavorwire "must read," and placed on the "brilliant highbrow" quadrant of New York's Approval Matrix, Republic of Outsiders also was praised by Douglas Rushkoff, author of Present Shock, as “an essential account of how and why fringe activism has become central to our culture and politics in a digital age.”