Publisher’s write-up:
‘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 read 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.’
How to do Nothing: Resisting the
Attention Economy is a book by the artist Jenny Odell – where she focuses on
how to do ‘nothing’, and avoiding the aspects of the modern world that highly
demand your attention such as the social media apps and the corporate world
that we have built.
She starts with describing her
neighbourhood in Oakland, California and her visits to the rose garden to
observe the nature around her and watch the birds. She goes on to describe the
joy of eventually beginning to identify different kinds of birds in her
neighbourhood by the sounds that they make. However, volunteering in the rose
garden or admiring the nature in today’s world would be considered as ‘doing
nothing’ as it does not generate any value to the economy.
From thereon, she moves on to explaining
the manner in which social media applications work – that their primary measure
is user engagement and thus, do everything possible to grab your attention. She
also has segments on social and political movements of the past, ranging from Thoreau
to the workers movement in San Francisco in 1940s. There are also a lot of anecdotes
to works of art throughout the book.
As you can observe from above, in
a 200 page book, she talks about social media, nature and bird watching,
building neighbourhood networks, political movements of the past and also works
of art – most of it with a fair amount of detail. This is the reason why I felt
the book was lacking focus – where her broad message was conveyed– which is to
engage more with the local community and enjoy small things around you rather
than being stuck in the ‘attention economy’; but her anecdotes seemed unnecessary.
The title was misleading too, to
add a bit of context, I read this book during the lockdown enforced by the coronavirus
pandemic. Therefore, the title seemed rather intriguing and even useful during
this period. However, this book was far from a ‘how to do’ than presenting her
own opinions and her very definition of negative was vague. To quote her:
‘For me, doing nothing means
disengaging from one framework (the attention economy) not only to give myself
time to think, but to do something else in another framework.’ – page 179
To her, nothing merely means what
is not deemed ‘productive’ by the capitalist society such as bird watching or
enjoying the rose garden. She goes on to urge us to come out of such
perceptions to avoid the attention economy and enjoy the nature around us.
While that is a very good suggestion, investigating the varieties of plants and
birds in a locality is unlikely to be the interest of every person; for
instance, my very act of reading her book was not ‘productive’ because that
does not contribute to the economy in anyway (yes, I did pay for the book but
then, that is where the ‘economic value’ of the transaction ended). Thus, her
definition of the word nothing was vague and what she largely seems to
mean is doing something not deemed productive (which frankly should cover even
watching a free to air television channel).
To conclude, I appreciate the
broad message of the book and based on my discussions on the book with local book
clubs around (by video!), a lot of us agree that we may have a new perspective
while meeting neighbours or looking at birds in the sky. That small change in
our lives could be attributed as a success of the writer. However, presentation
is very important in a non-fiction work and this book was neither easy to read
nor was it worth the arduous reading effort.
On that note, I would award the
book a rating four on ten.
Rating – 4/10
Have a nice day,
Andy
Andy