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5.5k reviews for:
Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know about the People We Don't Know
Malcolm Gladwell
3.83 AVERAGE
5.5k reviews for:
Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know about the People We Don't Know
Malcolm Gladwell
3.83 AVERAGE
This book was definitely provocative...tackling sensitive subjects like racism and sexual abuse isn't easy. However, Gladwell did a great job with both. In explaining that despite our ingrained belief in the ability to read people, we just cannot, Gladwell magnifies that our perceptions of reading people are costly. Certain signs we believe are telltale signs of lying could be signs of one's personality trait and so forth. Towards the end, it felt a bit disjointed though.
informative
informative
reflective
medium-paced
informative
medium-paced
informative
sad
fast-paced
dark
informative
slow-paced
The book is largely about stories of miscommunication. Gladwell did a great job at portraying both sides of the stories, in most cases, questioning what we think we know to be true.
Gladwell didn’t fully convince me of his point, which I will leave out due to spoilers, but it certainly provided some insight into our confirmation biases.
Talking to strangers, Gladwell writes, "requires humility and thoughtfulness and a willingness to look beyond the stranger, and take time and place and context into account."
Gladwell didn’t fully convince me of his point, which I will leave out due to spoilers, but it certainly provided some insight into our confirmation biases.
Talking to strangers, Gladwell writes, "requires humility and thoughtfulness and a willingness to look beyond the stranger, and take time and place and context into account."
challenging
emotional
informative
reflective
medium-paced
Informational about political and social issues and how people approach situations, but got reduced to 3 stars bc of the casual mention of Israel. We're not doing that - bye!
Couldn’t finish the last chapters, because I can’t take this author seriously anymore. His views are completely fucked up and awful.
informative
reflective
medium-paced
Gladwell argues his points well. I think there are cultural factors he hasn’t accounted for that play into how we interact with other people, but they don’t negate the general thrust of his argument that most people want to believe that humans are good, and default to that in their interactions with others. He did verge on excusing extremely harmful behaviour at a couple of points by redirecting the blame but then smoothed that out with elaborations on the topic. Still not an easy read by any means and I expect that those who would most benefit from reflecting on their behaviour will neither see this nor benefit from its advice.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Police brutality
Moderate: Child abuse, Suicide
Minor: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Torture