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5.53k reviews for:
Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know about the People We Don't Know
Malcolm Gladwell
3.83 AVERAGE
5.53k reviews for:
Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know about the People We Don't Know
Malcolm Gladwell
3.83 AVERAGE
some interesting research, kind of confusing, but some take-aways i.e. humans tend to default to believing what people say, different cultures interpret facial expressions differently, police are taught to act as though people are lying and hiding something
dark
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual assault, Suicide, Police brutality
challenging
informative
reflective
medium-paced
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual assault
“If you are blind to the ideas that underly our mistakes with strangers and to the institutions and practices that we construct around those ideas, then all you are left with is the personal.”
This was a great read! Gladwell delves into the psychology of understanding others in an eye-opening way. If everyone read this book, maybe we could all “default to truth” and understand one another more before jumping to false conclusions. Highly recommend the audiobook - it’s different than any audiobook I’ve ever listened to!
This was a great read! Gladwell delves into the psychology of understanding others in an eye-opening way. If everyone read this book, maybe we could all “default to truth” and understand one another more before jumping to false conclusions. Highly recommend the audiobook - it’s different than any audiobook I’ve ever listened to!
informative
medium-paced
More like 3.5. I love Revisionist History and how Malcolm Gladwell tells stories, so I knew I wanted to do the audio book. I could have looked at the description more ahead of time to know the topics would be what they were. I was expecting more of a lighter tone and every day talking to stranger insights… although that wouldn’t have been very typical of him anyways. It started good conversations with my partner and I about truth bias, reading others, and more that were interesting. 3.5 stars for challenging me to see scenarios in new light and start interesting conversations, but I was never hooked.
Got the audiobook version of this and it was by far the highest quality audiobook I've ever read. Care of a great podcast put into it. This book is class Gladwell but the title is slightly misleading. It's more about understanding how we judge ourselves versus how we judge others and how that impacts our interactions with strangers. "Talking to Strangers" definitely has a better ring to it though ;)
Listened to audiobook. Alright, maybe this wasn’t the best Gladwell book to start with. There were a couple of helpful takeaways, like how society creates many issues we experience when it comes to learning/talking to people we don’t know. However, there were a lot of very triggering descriptions. He does give a disclaimer in the intro that he’ll be mentioning cases that involve topics like sexual abuse, self-harm, and pedophilia, but wow, the level of detail was a bit much. I also had trouble seeing how his “case studies” connected to each other. The first 2-3 chapters were excellent, but once he started talking about the Brock Turner case and the Jerry Sandusky and Larry Nasser cases, I really had trouble seeing how these connected to his overarching point. It always sounded like a major stretch.
Anyway. I didn’t like this and I should’ve stopped listening when I started feeling like it wasn’t connecting back to anything relevant, but I pushed through, and it was a waste of my time.
Anyway. I didn’t like this and I should’ve stopped listening when I started feeling like it wasn’t connecting back to anything relevant, but I pushed through, and it was a waste of my time.
A fascinating read with some really interesting anecdotes
interesting. hard to follow the point at times, but interesting listen as always. not one i would recommend to others i don't think