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From the author of New York Times bestseller You're Wearing That? this bestselling classic work draws upon groundbreaking research by an acclaimed sociolinguist to show that women and men live in different worlds, made of different words. Women and men live in different worlds...made of different words. Spending nearly four years on the New York Times bestseller list, including eight months at number one, You Just Don't Understand is a true cultural and intellectual phenomenon. This is the book that brought gender differences in ways of speaking to the forefront of public awareness. With a rare combination of scientific insight and delightful, humorous writing, Tannen shows why women and men can walk away from the same conversation with completely different impressions of what was said. Studded with lively and entertaining examples of real conversations, this book gives you the tools to understand what went wrong -- and to find a common language in which to strengthen relationships at work and at home. A classic in the field of interpersonal relations, this book will change forever the way you approach conversations. … (more)
User reviews
Dr. Tannen's research, including transcripts of conversations from studies of boys, girls, men, and women of various ages and anecdotal evidence from real conversations persuasively makes the case for the status and connection at work in every conversation. I appreciated that the author never makes a moral judgment about the way one or the other interprets the conversation. She merely explains what's going on from each point of view, giving each party the language to express what they're trying to do or say. I recognized many conversations as ones I have had with my brother, my father, and male friends. Some of the topics she touches on, such as high-involvement/high-considerate and direct/indirect ways of speaking are beneficial even in conversations with people of the same sex (for example, as a "high-involvement speaker" I can now explain to my family that I really do end a sentence with "and" waiting for someone to overlap my speech). Because she ties everything back to the original ideas of status and connection, her comments on conversations do become a bit repetitive after awhile. But her conversational style and clear presentation of a persuasive argument make this book worth reading.
Do you ever wonder why even your own gender acts in such a particular why? Read this book.
Seriously, I thought this book would be a very dull, dry, read. Gender and linguistics aren't the most exciting of subjects, usually
My husband even picked up this book and flipped through and said he was impressed by it. My husband rarely reads books.
As a writer, I think this book will be an excellent source for honing dialog and creating conflict. This is a keeper.
It is good for those who's doing relevant research, but i think this book is not an ideal one to read for fun.
Fast forward to Nov 2006, my
Another thing that bothered me was the way Tannen conflated gender with personality. Some people are more taciturn than others, but gender is not the indicator, per se.
A lot of the research and findings that Deborah Tannen has accomplished in her career stems from this book that is now 30 years old. In that