Malcolm Gladwell, host of the podcast Revisionist History and author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Outliers, offers a powerful examination of our interactions with strangers and why they often go wrong–now with a new afterword by the author. A Best Book of the Year: The Financial Times, Bloomberg, Chicago Tribune, and Detroit Free Press How did Fidel Castro fool the CIA for a … Tribune, and Detroit Free Press
How did Fidel Castro fool the CIA for a generation? Why did Neville Chamberlain think he could trust Adolf Hitler? Why are campus sexual assaults on the rise? Do television sitcoms teach us something about the way we relate to one another that isn’t true?
Talking to Strangers is a classically Gladwellian intellectual adventure, a challenging and controversial excursion through history, psychology, and scandals taken straight from the news. He revisits the deceptions of Bernie Madoff, the trial of Amanda Knox, the suicide of Sylvia Plath, the Jerry Sandusky pedophilia scandal at Penn State University, and the death of Sandra Bland–throwing our understanding of these and other stories into doubt.
Something is very wrong, Gladwell argues, with the tools and strategies we use to make sense of people we don’t know. And because we don’t know how to talk to strangers, we are inviting conflict and misunderstanding in ways that have a profound effect on our lives and our world. In his first book since his #1 bestseller David and Goliath, Malcolm Gladwell has written a gripping guidebook for troubled times.
Should be required reading for everybody associated with law enforcement, child welfare, DEI, and life in the current United States. His best so far, methinks, for bringing factual analysis to topics that need re-examining under the light of truth. Explains why several Very Bad Things keep happening to good people in present day American society. In those explanations lies hope for better choices as we stagger forward.
Some people feel that Gladwell smooths out the edges too much and loses nuance in his discussions of contemporary society, but I always enjoy his books. In this one, he uses (for the most part) highly publicized cases–Brock Turner (Stanford rape case), Amanda Knox, etc.–and pop-culture to introduce certain concepts that call into question how we interpret the actions and behaviors of people we don’t know. One of my favorite sections was about the fallacy of transparency. For this he uses the episode of FRIENDS in which Ross sees Monica and Chandler together. Ross is shocked and surprised–and his expression is “transparent”: his eyebrows are up and eyes are wide and jaw is dropped. But, as Gladwell says, life is not like FRIENDS. He cites a scientific experiment with people put in situations that result in the feeling of shock and surprise and the vast majority did NOT have Ross’s markers. This is just one example, but I felt this book was nuanced and illuminating and (reassuringly) provided no easy answers to the problem of reading strangers.
As usual…Malcolm Gladwell makes me think with this book. It is written in the same style as his other books and carries the same insightful perspectives. If you get a chance, download the audio book. It includes a “podcast-like” format with music. You won’t be able to get Janelle Monáe’s song, ‘Hell You Talmbout’ out of your head for days.
I love the way Malcolm Gladwell thinks outside the box. He starts with a premise and uses an incident to illustrate it. Then he builds on it and weaves a whole bunch of theories and observations around it to a fascinatingly original conclusion. His books are never boring!
Thought-provoking, easy nonfiction read. The book begins and ends with the incident in July 2015 of Sandra Bland, a young African American woman pulled over for a traffic stop by an over zealous white cop. The premise of the book, borne out by examination of multiple other high-profile cases in the news is simple. In cases like Amanda Knox, Jerry Sandusky, Bernie Madoff, a high-profile CIA Cuban spy what we see, is not what is. Why? We make mistakes, rush to judge, and assess others through our own frame of reference. If you want to think timely, look at the misinterpretations of white cops and black victims. People have been convicted of murder “because their eyes looked shifty, they didn’t show remorse, et al.”
That in itself is not earth shattering, but this book tries to answer “Why?” and offer constructive explanations. He builds his cases logically, factually, and has done his homework. We all like to think we are good judges of character, because most of us assume honesty first. Statistically we can be wrong 80% of the time. Wisdom begins with recognizing that and looking to the facts. The book was recommended by my library, so I decided to try it. It’s a fairly easy read, even with a surprising amount of research. This is my first book by Malcom Gladwell. I will be thinking about this one for many days to come especially thinking of a couple of key (and expensive) mistakes in my life that came from misjudging the person I was dealing with.
Very well-written so it flows even while he explodes several of the most common things we take for granted which are actually myths. Good addition to the literature on the frequent differences between hard, researched science and strongly held beliefs without factual support.
This book makes you think about your approach to interactions with people you don’t know. Researched stories illustrate just how complicated new relationships can be- and how easy it is for things to go wrong.
This book gives wonderful insight about trust and being guarded when communicating with strangers.
Malcolm is not for everyone, but I find his insights genius!
All of Gladwell’s books do this: Make you think about what you just read for a good long time.
Coupling? Yep. Its on the mind.
One thing for sure, I will try to check myself when I react to someone’s reaction.
The writing feels like a fun little downhill ride you don’t want to get off.
An eye-openner
I loved it, I’ve already recommended it to my coworkers and boyfriend and plan on buying it for a Christmas gift. I might even ask Santa for one of Malcolm Gladwell’s other books.
i really enjoyed a lot of this book. I found the chapter on Brock Turner exasperating- its hard for me to see how having sex with an uncoscious woman is a misreading of social cues, even if both parties are black out drunk. In general, this is an intriguing look at a fascinating issue
Interesting juxtaposition to his previous books. Interesting ideas but the conclusion is a little lacking.
It wasn’t what I expected after his other books. I put it down
A deeply offensive explanation of police brutality and sexual assault. Main claim is that rape and police brutality occurs because of miscommunication. Does so by misrepresenting the situations he uses as case studies and twisting them to fit this narrative. A victim-blaming mess.
Which is deeply disappointing considering how much I’ve loved his previous works. I think there was some merit to his discussion of the cuban spy case, but many of the other cases are a swing and a miss.
Hi…Sharon? Please stop using my email address for things. I believe it may be accidental but I lid appreciate it if it stopped happening.
Life changing When it comes to sizing up people by their behavior or appearances.
Love this book. It has been a long time since I read a book that I simply could not put down. Gladwell’s writing is at its best in his latest book.
While I disagreed with some of Gladwell’s positions, his points certainly do drive home. Whether we find some of his points offensive or not, this book provides a great deal of evidence in support of his main premise, historically and in conflict. We too often misinterpret words, actions and nonverbal signals OR we do not communicate with each other at all. We jump to conclusions about a person, without being aware of our own inherent responses, believing we are objective. The author argues the opposite. We are far from objective. It took a few chapters to draw me into this book and I was angered at times which makes for engaged reading. We live in a global world, with growing polarization and if nothing else, this book provides evidence and insights that SHOULD cause us to reflect and be aware of our own biases.