SORAYA CHEMALY

Hi, it’s nice to meet you!

I’m a journalist, activist, and author. My work focuses on the words we use, the images we make, and how to act to build a better world.

New Release

The Resilience Myth: New Thinking on Grit, Strength, and Growth after Trauma

AVAILABLE NOW

In this thought-provoking exploration, cultural critic Soraya Chemaly challenges our most dearly held, common myths of resilience and urges us to shift our perspective from prioritizing individualized traits and skills to uplifting collective care, material life, and open-ended connections with our communities. Resilience, she proves, is always relational.

Chemaly dismantles the notions of resilience rooted in the philosophies of mind over matter, “mental toughness,” “strength,” and “positive thinking,” arguing that our modern version of “resilience” is a bill of goods sold to us by capitalism, colonialism, and ideologies that embrace supremacy over others.

Blending rigorous research and enthralling personal storytelling, The Resilience Myth offers a new vision for collective healing by emphasizing care for our neighbors and our environments above just ourselves. By prioritizing compassion, creativity, and connection, this book ignites essential conversations about fostering resilience for all, not just for those who can afford it.

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Praise for The Resilience Myth

“Thoughtful and well-argued, this book offers a humane vision of the ways people must adapt their ideas of what it means to thrive to a radically changing world. . . . Provocative, necessary reading.”

—Kirkus

“Ambitious. . . using a feminist and anticapitalistic framework to interrogate notions of resilience. . . this is sure to spark conversation.”

—Publishers Weekly

“Resilience is an ideology—comprising elements of individualism, bootstraps, and even victim-blaming. With characteristically brilliant arguments and meticulous research, Chemaly demolishes this ideology in The Resilience Mythand shows us how to build something so much better for everyone facing adversity. A must-read book for our age.”

—Kate Manne, author of Down Girl

“Chemaly has once again written the book we desperately need. In The Resilience Myth, Chemaly skillfully weaves science, anthropology, and history with poignant personal stories teaching us not only what real resilience looks like, but also why a new definition is more urgent than ever.”

—Dr. Pooja Lakshmin MD, psychiatrist and bestselling author of Real Self-Care

“Soraya Chemaly has written a searing indictment of one of the most pernicious fictions in America: that self-reliance can save us. With her signature clarity and penetrating mind, she subverts the ideologies of isolation that keep us divided and dissociated from ourselves and other people. Deeply informative and inspiring, The Resilience Myth is an urgent corrective to the mind/body and self/other ruptures at the heart of our collective crises. It’s a groundbreaking road map to true strength: shared struggle.”

—Jean Guerrero, author of Hatemonger

“A vital, life-saving must-read for anyone who has been force-fed the word ‘resilient’ when they feel anything but. The book I wish I'd had when I was neck-deep in trauma.”

—Nora McInerny, author of Bad Vibes Only and the host of It’s Going To Be OK

“Getting back on one's horse after a personal catastrophe feels evermore challenging—and Chemaly has, with clarity, patience, and rigor— illustrated why it's not just you, when all of us are asking, ‘Is it just me?’ She makes sense of what exists in our culture that isolates us from one another during times when we need each other most, providing a guiding light toward strength and interdependence, and ultimately, love.”