Desocialisation in Cormac McCarthy’s <i>The Road</i>

The relationship of the father and the son is a prevalent theme throughout the novel. However it is the educational nature of their relationship which lends poignancy to the absence of society in the novel. The father is teaching the son how to survive in a cultureless society. The norms and boundaries which we are used to have long since decayed along with the apocalyptic ‘event’ which is left ambiguous.

In social / communication studies there is a theory referred to as ‘socialisation’. Like words and basic actions, a baby learns the rudiments of human existence from its parents/guardians. At first it is a nonsense sound or movement which produces a positive reaction such as weird sounds or presents which encourage the baby to repeat. Later the baby attaches meaning to the sounds and movement and can achieve a more specific reward such as food or attention.

Socialisation is a similar pattern of encouraging (and discouraging) certain behaviours and words. The ‘teachers’ expand from immediate family to institutions such as schools, and to friends and wider family. From these we learn the boundaries of society and what is ‘normal’. Dress codes, accents, mannerisms and to some degree personality all develop as a result of how we have been socialised. A baby may think nothing of wailing and defecating in public but we quickly learn that these behaviours are unacceptable. Whether or not we choose to ‘conform’ is a different matter …

In The Road the various inputs in socialisation are absent, the responsibility all remains with the father. For the most part of the novel it is only the father and the son present in the narration. The extraneous characters are all treated as outsiders: distrusted and almost always feared. The son’s experience is thus a reversal of our own. His father is essentially ‘desocialising’ him: teaching his to reject any form of company outside of their duo. Their singular act of humanity towards the character of Eli results in the threat of them losing their entire supplies, potentially facing starvation reinforcing the son’s desocialisation.

The reversal is important to anyone considering the theme of ‘decay’ in The Road. In a world where society has been broken it is further led into destruction by the savage nature of humans. We will ultimately do anything to preserve our own survival, including attacking and in some cases cannibalising our own. We need not look too far back into our own history for examples of our savage nature (arctic explorers for example…) to see that McCarthy’s pessimistic prediction may have some grounding.

It is interesting that at the end of the novel the group which ‘adopt’ the son are far more forgiving and humane. It suggests that in a wider group of people it has been possible to maintain that level of noble humanity we believe is innate. It is only after the father’s death that the son is able to interact successfully with outsiders. However it is possible that small pockets of humane humans still survived but the father’s suspicion of the world may have blinded the narration; making the world appear more desolate than it is. It is difficult to be any more certain about this aspect of the novel as McCarthy leaves a lot of ideas open to the reader’s interpretation.

Why is it only when the son is completely alone is he able to find civilised company? If anyone has any more thoughts about this please comment! I’ve thought myself into distraction!