Performance undercuts thesis

After Trump won, I decided I needed to read more about the white America that I never talk to. I started with this book because it was recommended by the Director of the National Book Foundation, but immediately ran into a serious flaw in that recommendation: it's written by a UCBerkeley professor. She talks about the empathy wall, but here I am trying to reach across that divide and doing it by means of somebody well entrenched on my side.

The biggest problem I had with this as an audible experience is that the reader has a seriously pretentious accent. What is that? It's not any accent I've encountered in real life. It's some performance projection, but undermines the content. One of the conclusions the author reached in her study of right wing Southern Republicans is that their feelings are hurt by what they perceive to be the disdain the left has for their lifestyle, priorities, and voting. I think the author makes an effort to balance her disagreement and to express her gratitude for their hospitality and willingness to talk to her, the tone of the reader in this audio version is so bizarre that it reinforces the sense that the liberal elite fancies itself superior to "real" America.

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Buyer beware

I was so disappointed with this book. I am a little to the right of center but more left leaning on some issues, the environment being one. But the whole first half of this book is basically a diatribe against big business pollution in the guise of "trying to scale the wall of empathy." Even when she finally got to what she thought the real issue was, she framed the rest of the book in that overly simplified analogy and never bothered to explore any further.
The narrator had an arrogant, sarcastic tone whenever she read quotes from tea partyers, which just added to the complete lack of empathy the book ended up portraying. I am very interested in this subject, but it would be lovely if someone with more genuine motives would write a book on it.

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Enlightening

What disappointed you about Strangers in Their Own Land?

See my full review

Has Strangers in Their Own Land turned you off from other books in this genre?

No

How did the narrator detract from the book?

See in my review

You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?

Potential if bias can be removed

Any additional comments?

Ms. Hochschild had a chance to bridge a divide but she blew it. First my bona fides. I am a 55yo physician born and raised in Georgia, living in South Carolina and at this moment on my way to visit dear friends and family in St. Landry Parish, Louisiana. I'm a first doctor in my family and love caring for patients, and do so without regard to race, creed, religion, sexual orientation or the ability to pay. I do however despise Obamacare and what it has done to my profession, but I digress. I am that demographic the author came to "study."

Ms. Hochschild would start off well enough, describing a character and area of Louisiana accurately, but out of nowhere would launch into a diatribe about the oil industry. the Koch Brothers and Fox News (said repeatedly with emphasis and disdain) but no mention of government bureaucratic overreach or George Soros or any of, in our view, legitimate concerns we have. I could tell in the first two chapters that this was not an objective scientific sociology study of a demographic but an affirmation of the presumed moral superiority of the author's liberal followers.

What is worse is the horrendous narration of the audiobook. While I'm sure that Suzanne Toren is a fine and decent lady her voice has a superior "look-down-your-nose" tone to a Southerner's ear. Her faux accent did not even remotely come close to Cadiens-du-meche or River-Roads Cajun accents. The effect is to portray those folks as the lesser informed or educated, intended or not.

I applaud the author for at least starting out with the intention of looking at a culture so different from her own in order to improve the understanding of that culture by those that think as she does, but ultimately she fails, succumbing to the very bias that has helped lead to this divide in our nation. It is for this reason I find the book enlightening. How can urban dwellers that claim superior education and tolerance have such a hard time understanding us, accepting us, talking to us without labeling us as backward rubes, racists, misogynists and xenophobes? In my opinion that is the definition of xenophobia itself. Thank God for the 12th Amendment.

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Informative, entertaining, and, yes, life-changing

I read this book to find out why people in the middle of our country and in the South voted for Trump. That's what I found out. Along the way, it was enjoyable and entertaining.

I had already read "Hillbilly Elegy" and "The Unwinding." Hochschild, the author and a sociologist, was able to get into the minds and hearts of people in a Louisiana bayou town. While she started as a University of California, Berkeley, professor, she also lived with these people for five years. She became friends with them and part of their community. So, she was able to open me up to understanding where these people are coming from. This is a major change in my life--now I have hope that we Americans can better understand each other.

If we are to bind up the gaping chasm between Liberals and Trump-supporters, we must understand each other. We must find common ground. I believe that there is common ground if we get to know each other better.

I highly recommend "Strangers in Their Own Land."

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I Tried; I Really Tried...

Would you ever listen to anything by Arlie Russell Hochschild again?

Probably not.

Any additional comments?

This book was described in that I did not think I would hear the deep-liberal overtones, inflections and sarcasm of the mostly conservative residents of the deep south. But, it's all over the book. I skipped around after an hour or so; I was really hoping for an unbiased analysis. Not to be. Maybe it was the way the narrator read it, but I believe this author's background could never allow her to present a fair, indiscriminate view of the land and people where I grew up.

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Must read for political moderates

What made the experience of listening to Strangers in Their Own Land the most enjoyable?

Complex issues are easy to conceptualize. The "Deep Stories" of the politically right and left were helpful in understanding and remembering the concepts of the great paradox and the empathy wall in the book.

What other book might you compare Strangers in Their Own Land to and why?

Hillbilly Elegy

What about Suzanne Toren’s performance did you like?

voice is easy to listen to and it was like listening to the author.

If you could give Strangers in Their Own Land a new subtitle, what would it be?

Reduce political partisanism

Any additional comments?

At the end of the book she forgets the ideas of staying objective with the empathy wall and provides only the politically left view in her data.

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Thought-provoking

Hochschild is a University of California Berkeley sociologist. She states she was attempting to understand the Great Paradox: the fact that people in the poorest states who most need federal programs consistently vote for candidates who oppose those programs. The author traveled to Louisiana one of the poorest states and the one hardest hit by environmental pollution.

The people see their homes fall into sink holes caused by toxic waste, see deformities in wildlife and cancer in people including children caused by industrial pollution. They support deregulation of industry and cuts in federal aid. Hochschild says they tell her pollution is the sacrifice they have to make for capitalism. They apparently have a great mistrust of the federal government even more so than state government.

One comment the author made stuck with me. “She quickly realized that many of the stated views held by the tea party members were often not fact based but rather grounded in what life FEELS like to them.”

I gained some information and understanding from this book. I was amazed at the destruction of Louisiana by industrial pollution. I learned enough to know we have some big problems in this country that have created this situation and will tolerate the massive dangerous pollution. Louisiana is such a beautiful area; it makes me sick to learn about all the pollution. I liked the fact checking section at the end of the book; I found that most helpful. I also did a random check of the fact-checking and found the ones I looked up to be correct.

Suzanna Toren did a good job narrating the book. Toren is an award-winning audiobook narrator.

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Well-written, but I didn't learn anything.

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

It was time well-spent because it covered a social terrain that I had not experienced myself. However, as I mentioned in the title, the book humanized many stereotypes I had about southern white Christians, but did nothing to alter those stereotypes.

What was the most compelling aspect of this narrative?

The writer does an amazing job of creating captivating stories out of the people she interviewed. She presents them without cynicism or irony, never patronizing them, and does genuinely try to understand their views and their lives.To have such a balanced, nuanced story come from someone so strongly representing the Left was refreshing and inspiring. The stereotypes have not really been altered, but she takes great care to not make her subjects into caricatures.

What about Suzanne Toren’s performance did you like?

Toren's performance was phenomenal. I thought she did a great job with all the different accents, but as I said above these are not regional dialects I'm familiar with. So people from that area may be offended. I don't know.

Was Strangers in Their Own Land worth the listening time?

Overall I'd say it's not really worth the listening time. Part of doing research for a piece is considering if the information you're getting is different than what people already know. Or, to say it differently, if you're adding anything new to the conversation. But anyone who spends one entire day watching MSNBC and another entire day watching Fox News will learn everything that's in this book. That said, the information offered in Appendix C is worth the price of admission alone.

Any additional comments?

On it's reprinting, this book should be retitled, "Biting My Tongue For Five Years in Contemporary Louisiana As I Watched Countless Numbers of Republicans Refuse To Recognize White Privilege While Continually Shooting Themselves in the Foot." That's kind of clunky and long though. I don't know; I'm not in publishing.

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Amazing and eye-opening

Absolutely amazing, thought-provoking, and eye-opening. I couldn't recommend it more, especially to coastal liberals trying to wrap their minds around the results of the 2016 election.

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Maybe with different narrator

The content is thought provoking, but the narration is difficult to stick with. I listen for about an hour at a time--that's all I can take. The tone of the narrator is condescending...I imagine her saying: "...and then we observed the elusive male redneck in his natural environment... I still think her take is useful to listen to... as I find trying to keep an open mind challenging

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