Bullsht Comparisons, Andrew Brooks
Bullsht Comparisons, Andrew Brooks
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Bullsh*t Comparisons
A Field Guide to Thinking Critically in a World of Difference

Author: Andrew Brooks

Narrator: Andrew Brooks

Unabridged: 8 hr 40 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 05/23/2024


Synopsis

Bullshit Comparisons will challenge the way you think about rankings, charts, and other marketing and political tools designed to create odious and dangerous comparisons.

Is Boris Johnson really like Winston Churchill? Are electric cars actually greener than petrol ones? Which is the world's most successful university? Is Lisbon the new Barcelona? Should we compare the achievements of younger and older siblings even when we know it damages their self-worth? We make comparisons every day, but how helpful are they?

Looking across a dazzling range of situations both familiar and unfamiliar, Bullshit Comparisons is a groundbreaking examination of the role of comparison in modern society, illuminated by examples spanning from the FIFA World Footballer of the year, to wine-tasting in London, hospital care in Sierra Leone, and avocado farming in Colombia.

Challenging us to think critically about the use of comparison through accessible, personal, and often amusing research, Andrew Brooks reveals the uses and abuses of comparisons in a book that isn't like anything else.

About Andrew Brooks

Andrew Brooks is a lecturer in development geography at King's College London. His research examines connections between spaces of production and places of consumption, and particularly the geographies of economic and social change in Africa. Fieldwork has taken him to India, Papua New Guinea, and across Africa. Research in Africa has included extensive investigations of markets and politics in Malawi and Mozambique as well as Chinese investment in Zambia.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Harry on November 03, 2024

This is a worthwhile book, but it could have done with a bit more cooking. The threads don't quite hang together or come together cohesively. The core of Brooks' point is this: making comparisons and drawing analogies is an easy way to make an argument, but it's often not very accurate. We need to be......more