Hi, everyone, for a relatively short book of 346 pages, author Malcolm Gladwell sure covers a lot of ground in Talking With Strangers.

And before I kick off our initial, online discussion of the early part of the book, I have to say – if you haven’t had a chance to hear the audiobook version of this book – check it out! I “read” the book by combining reading the Kindle version and listening to the Audible audiobook version. And the audiobook version is very compelling as it  features  interviews with people mentioned in the book, like the intelligence officer the Mountain Climber and real life recordings of incidents described in the book, most notably the real life recording Sandra Blair made when she was pulled over for having a broken tail light.

I think it is fair to say the basic umbrella gist of the book, the one that covers all other aspects of it , is that people have a default truth belief setting, which Gladwell calls “Truth Default Theory.” So people in general, don’t know what the strangers they encounter, are thinking because humans are wired to believe people are telling the truth. Further, that people are frequently wrong when they think they know what other people, people that they don’t know (strangers) are thinking even if they are experts in a field.

And I’m running out of day here, it is almost 5:30, so I’ll have to cut this first discussion of the book a bit short.

I will say, that for me the most compelling story in the book, and the most horrifying, especially if you listen to the audiobook version, is the story of Sandra Bland as discussed in the introduction and final chapter of the book. No one should be pulled over by the police for a made up reason and then harassed and arrested because they protest of their unethical treatment; and then feel so despondent that they take their own life in jail days later.

I think Gladwell wanted to relay several major things in Talking With Strangers including

1. That people don’t know what strangers are thinking

2. That people default to truth belief mode

3. That some people think outside the truth-mode box and either see the truth more clearly than the majority of our society or completely misread the strangers.

And 4. That we need to do a better job at communicating with people and understanding strangers if we in the western world are to evolve our society into one that is truly more equal and ethical.

Those are in a nut shell, my initial thoughts about the book.

What did you think of the book?

Linda Reimer, SSCL