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Keeping It Fake With Eric Wilson

Image of Eric Wilson, who is a professor of English at Wake Forest University and the author of 'Keep It Fake.'
Wake Forest University

Eric Wilsonargues that the often-said phrases "shoot straight from the hip," "tell it like it is," and "keep it real" are all fallacies.

We regularly create less-than-authentic identities, whether it is through Facebook profiles, plastic surgeries, or tuning into a news channel that simply verifies our opinions, according to Wilson.

But he also says we should embrace the ways we choose to show ourselves, even if they are "fake." After all, if everything is fake, then everything is real, too.

In his new book, Keep It Fake (Farrar, Straus & Giroux/2015), Wilson draws on the science, philosophy and social pressures that shape our inauthentic lives, including his own.

Host Frank Stasio talks with Wilson, an English professor at Wake Forest University, about the pursuit of "inventing an authentic life."

Will Michaels is WUNC's Weekend Host and Reporter.
Longtime NPR correspondent Frank Stasio was named permanent host of The State of Things in June 2006. A native of Buffalo, Frank has been in radio since the age of 19. He began his public radio career at WOI in Ames, Iowa, where he was a magazine show anchor and the station's News Director.
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