How to Do Nothing, Jenny Odell
How to Do Nothing, Jenny Odell
4 Rating(s)
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How to Do Nothing
Resisting the Attention Economy

Author: Jenny Odell

Narrator: Rebecca Gibel

Unabridged: 8 hr 10 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 05/07/2019


Synopsis

A galvanizing critique of the forces vying for our attention—and our personal information—that redefines what we think of as productivity, reconnects us with the environment, and reveals all that we've been too distracted to see about ourselves and our world

Nothing is harder to do these days than nothing. But in a world where our value is determined by our 24/7 data productivity . . . doing nothing may be our most important form of resistance.

So argues artist and critic Jenny Odell in this field guide to doing nothing (at least as capitalism defines it). Odell sees our attention as the most precious—and overdrawn—resource we have. Once we can start paying a new kind of attention, she writes, we can undertake bolder forms of political action, reimagine humankind's role in the environment, and arrive at more meaningful understandings of happiness and progress.

Far from the simple anti-technology screed, or the back-to-nature meditation we hear so often, How to do Nothing is an action plan for thinking outside of capitalist narratives of efficiency and techno-determinism. Provocative, timely, and utterly persuasive, this book is a four-course meal in the age of Soylent.

About Jenny Odell

Jenny Odell is an artist and writer who teaches at Stanford, has been an artist-in-residence at places like the San Francisco dump, Facebook, the Internet Archive, and the San Francisco Planning Department, and has exhibited her art all over the world. She lives in Oakland.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Truce

First, I understand the negative reviews of this book. The title is misleading as this is not at all a how-to on unplugging or leaving social media (for that, maybe read Cal Newport’s Digital Minimalism or Catherine Price’s How to Break Up With Your Phone). Instead it’s a really well-researched book......more

Goodreads review by Andrew

full disclosure i literally only had one page left to read in this book but i left my backpack with it inside a chipotle, anyways it still changed my life......more

Goodreads review by Vicki

It's hard for me to reconcile that the fundamental things the author talks about in this book: the attention economy, its link to capitalism, how we all need to slow down and think about what we're doing, are all true, and yet the tone is just so smug, lecturing, and talking down at the reader from......more

Goodreads review by Danila

How to Do Nothing by Jenny Odell isn't your typical "how-to" book, and the audiobook version brought that to life in a deeply engaging way. Rather than offering a simple social media detox or self-help strategy, Odell dives into the deeper issue of the "attention economy." She highlights how pla......more