Overview

A rallying cry to fight the commodification of human attention, with the tools we need to reclaim our humanity, by a group of writers, artists, and activists in the vanguard of the movement “A stirring battle cry on behalf of our shared humanity against the forces that seek to diminish and degrade it. Downright invigorating. Just what the moment calls for.”—Chris Hayes, author of The Sirens’ Call We all feel it: something is seriously wrong. Our attention—that essential ability to give our minds and senses to the world—is being trapped, gutted, and sold out from under us by an industry of immense technological and financial power. The heedless exploitation of this vital capacity by a handful of tech companies is harming us all, reducing our very selfhood to that which can be quantified, bought, and sold—and shaking the foundations of our democracy. To push back against this “human fracking,” we need more than individual willpower or isolated efforts. We need a movement of collective resistance. Such a movement is beginning to bloom, and in this radical, first-of-its-kind guide, The Friends of Attention show us how to join the fight. We meet welders, nurses, poets, and surfers, all of whom are engaged in attentional practices. We learn to seek out sanctuaries—theaters and museums, houses of worship, dance parties—where together we can take refuge from the frackers. Attention Activism takes our apocalyptic present, turns it on its head, and reveals new vistas of human flourishing. Drawing on a rich legacy of critical intellectuals and the creative wisdom of diverse traditions, Attensity calls on us to come together to defeat the greedy dehumanizing forces of brute instrumentalization—and re-enchant the world.

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Reviews

“A stirring battle cry on behalf of our shared humanity against the forces that seek to diminish and degrade it. Downright invigorating. Just what the moment calls for.”—Chris Hayes, author of The Sirens’ Call “Attensity! reminds us that how we attend to the world shapes what the world can be for us, and for one another. With a lively, even joyful blend of philosophical seriousness and practical imagination, it invites us to see attention not as a private asset to be hoarded but as a shared capacity to be cultivated and protected.”—Kwame Anthony Appiah, author of Cosmopolitanism “At a time when most reports are of the world getting worse, here’s a zinging, erudite book that arrives with the happy news that one thing can get better if we put our minds to it. Attensity! is about how to reclaim one of our most powerful and valuable qualities—our attention—through a path back to the human things that matter: community, care, imagination, and art. It’s both a keen historical analysis and a call to movement-building from a group of people who have spent years working in the libraries and the classrooms but also, with the shared force of their attention, in the ever-changing streets.”—Nathan Heller, staff writer, The New Yorker “Attensity! is a thrilling declaration of independence from tech’s tyranny over our human spirits. We feel the human and humane surge to renewed life through its call to each of us to reclaim ownership of our own attention, and of the actions we can cultivate with it—for ourselves and in our own names, instead of at the bidding of machines.”—Danielle Allen, author of Our Declaration: A Reading of the Declaration of Independence in Defense of Equality “It is not always that you come across a book that changes how you see the world. Attensity! is an extraordinary book—every chapter has revelations that will make you stop and reconsider how you are living your life and reclaim the life that we have been given.”—Tim Wu, author of The Age of Extraction and The Attention Merchants “Attensity! is an unprecedented, impassioned intervention in one of the urgent crises of the twenty-first century. This uncompromising and collectively conceived project is a declaration of tenacious opposition to the ongoing techno-colonization and desolation of our lived time, our attentiveness, and our capacities to care for others, and it fearlessly proposes the creative forms of communal activism and resistance needed to reclaim a shared and livable world.”—Jonathan Crary, author of Scorched Earth “This timely call to action shines a light on the technological and corporate forces that have captured and monetized our attention. Drawing on fields as diverse as neuroscience and philosophy, Attensity! offers a brilliant analysis of the fallout of attention capture for selfhood, community, and the environment. An illuminating and liberating read.”—Rob Nixon, author of Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor

“A stirring battle cry on behalf of our shared humanity against the forces that seek to diminish and degrade it. Downright invigorating. Just what the moment calls for.”—Chris Hayes, author of The Sirens’ Call “Attensity! is about how to reclaim one of our most powerful and valuable qualities—our attention—through a path back to the human things that matter: community, care, imagination, and art.”—Nathan Heller, staff writer, The New Yorker “With a lively, even joyful blend of philosophical seriousness and practical imagination, it invites us to see attention not as a private asset to be hoarded but as a shared capacity to be cultivated and protected.”—Kwame Anthony Appiah, author of Cosmopolitanism “Attensity! is a thrilling declaration of independence from tech’s tyranny over our human spirits. We feel the human and humane surge to renewed life through its call to each of us to reclaim ownership of our own attention.”—Danielle Allen, author of Our Declaration: A Reading of the Declaration of Independence in Defense of Equality “It is not always that you come across a book that changes how you see the world. Attensity! is an extraordinary book—every chapter has revelations that will make you stop and reconsider how you are living your life and reclaim the life that we have been given.”—Tim Wu, author of The Age of Extraction and The Attention Merchants “Attensity! is an unprecedented, impassioned intervention in one of the urgent crises of the twenty-first century.”—Jonathan Crary, author of Scorched Earth “An illuminating and liberating read.”—Rob Nixon, author of Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor “This is an ambitious text that will demand much of all of us readers beyond the page. It is asking vital questions about the potential of rewiring our lives in a time of growing crisis, where avalanches of information and access threaten the present and future of care, of close attention.”—Hanif Abdurraqib, author of There’s Always This Year “Pay attention: If you are human, you must read this book. Also, please note that the term ‘attention’ has been colonized and made to mean the opposite of what it used to. According to AI people, it now means clearing out context to make less work for pattern-finding algorithms. Don’t let algorithms clear YOU out.”—Jaron Lanier, author of You Are Not a Gadget “An essential call to arms to fight back against the fracking of our minds—and an indispensable guide to reclaiming the human spirit.”—Tristan Harris, co-founder of the Center for Humane Technology “Luminous . . . Attensity! is not just a book to be read—it’s a call to be answered, a vision to be embraced, a future to be built.”—James Williams, author of Stand Out of Our Light

Author Information

The Friends of Attention is a collective of activists, artists, and thinkers. Three editors and long-standing ""Friends"" helped Attensity! take shape: D. Graham Burnett is the Henry Charles Lea Professor of history of science at Princeton University. Alyssa Loh, a filmmaker, co-directed the short film “Twelve Theses on Attention.” Peter Schmidt is the Program Director of the Strother School of Radical Attention.

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