Talking to strangers : what we should know about the people we don't know / Malcolm Gladwell.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Gladwell, Malcolm, 1963- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Psychology, Applied.

Strangers.

Conduct of life--Miscellanea.

Conduct of life.

Interpersonal relations--Miscellanea.

Interpersonal relations.

Trust.

Genre:

Trivia and miscellanea.

Informational works.

Physical Description:

xii, 386 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

New York : Little, Brown and Company, 2019.

Summary:

In this thoughtful treatise spurred by the 2015 death of African-American academic Sandra Bland in jail after a traffic stop, New Yorker writer Gladwell (The Tipping Point) aims to figure out the strategies people use to assess strangers-to "analyze, critique them, figure out where they came from, figure out how to fix them," in other words: to understand how to balance trust and safety. He uses a variety of examples from history and recent headlines to illustrate that people size up the motivations, emotions, and trustworthiness of those they don't know both wrongly and with misplaced confidence.

Contents:

Introduction: "Step out of the car!"

Part one: Spies and diplomats: two puzzles. Fidel Castro's revenge ; Getting to know der Führer

Part two: Default to truth. The queen of Cuba ; The holy fool ; Case study: The boy in the shower

Part three: Transparency. The Friends fallacy ; A (short) explanation of the Amanda Knox case ; Case study: The fraternity party

Part four: Lessons. KSM: what happens when the stranger is a terrorist?

Part five: Coupling. Sylvia Plath ; Case study: The Kansas City experiments ; Sandra Bland.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 349-379) and index.

Local Notes:

Athenaeum copy: Jones Fund bookplate.

ISBN:

9780316478526

0316478520

9780316536233

0316536237

9780316536240

0316536245

OCLC:

1107437182