Summary Of Outliers By Malcolm Gladwell

Malcolm Gladwell has worked for the New Yorker and the Washington Post, and has multiple bestselling titles to his name. As a journalist and a public speaker, Gladwell’s work demands an accessible (and at times witty) tone, and this pattern is evident in Outliers: The Story of Success. A short read with helpful footnotes may disguise itself as yet another grabby “guide to success,” but Outliers defies this preconceived notion. Rather, it challenges the exhausted trope of the “rags to riches” story, and examines the role of privilege and “luck” in personal and professional achievement. To question the validity of an idea so central to late capitalist thinking is a sensitive and potentially confrontational topic, so Gladwell applies his knowledge in Journalistic narration to assert his theory in an inoffensive manner. To maintain this, Outliers starts with “neutral” fact and builds up towards political points, operates with a specific structure throughout,
As elaborated in “The Ethnic Theory of Plane Crashes,” hierarchy-based tones create barriers of language. Rather than sounding authoritative, Gladwell speaks casually directly to the reader, while still remaining assertive. The approach is often quasi interactive; he mentions a “test” for microsoft employees that asked them why manhole covers are round. In a footnote, he says “the answer is that a round manhole cover can’t fall into the hole, no matter how much you try to make it. A rectangular cover can: all you have to do is tilt it sideways. There, now you can get a job at Microsoft.” With allusions like Microsoft and The Beatles, a sense of familiarity is also established through allusion to pop culture. In lesser known examples, Gladwell provides thorough description. A “friendly” and familiar approach broadens the audience and makes the book’s reception enjoyable, although its approach distances itself from the kitchy “grabbiness” of tabloid