Summer Reading Assignment 2012 For All First-Year Students
Purchase "Blink" online from the campus bookstore.
This summer all incoming first-year students will be expected to read "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell. The book will be used in September Orientation, and in all first-year English classes. Please visit the summer reading blog to learn more about the First Year Book Project. Also view the Reader's Study Guide for "Blink".
Here is a review of "Blink" from Amazon.com:
Blink is about the first two seconds of looking--the decisive glance that knows in an instant. Gladwell, the best-selling author of The Tipping Point, campaigns for snap judgments and mind reading with a gift for translating research into splendid storytelling. Building his case with scenes from a marriage, heart attack triage, speed dating, choking on the golf course, selling cars, and military maneuvers, he persuades readers to think small and focus on the meaning of "thin slices" of behavior. The key is to rely on our "adaptive unconscious"--a 24/7 mental valet--that provides us with instant and sophisticated information to warn of danger, read a stranger, or react to a new idea.
Gladwell includes caveats about leaping to conclusions: marketers can manipulate our first impressions, high arousal moments make us "mind blind," focusing on the wrong cue leaves us vulnerable to "the Warren Harding Effect" (i.e., voting for a handsome but hapless president). In a provocative chapter that exposes the "dark side of blink," he illuminates the failure of rapid cognition in the tragic stakeout and murder of Amadou Diallo in the Bronx. He underlines studies about autism, facial reading and cardio uptick to urge training that enhances high-stakes decision-making. In this brilliant, cage-rattling book, one can only wish for a thicker slice of Gladwell's ideas about what Blink Camp might look like. --Barbara Mackoff
For more information on the book, please visit Gladwell.com.
Summer Reading Assignment Book Purchase
The campus bookstore is offering "Blink" to all first-year students at a greatly reduced price. The list price for the book is $25.95, but you can order yours today for only $11 new or $8.25 used! Click on the link below to purchase your copy of the book.
