Modern Romance by Aziz Ansari
I've been with my husband for over half my life. He was my prom date. We grew up five minutes away from each other. We started dating before cell phones (nevermind smartphones) were something everyone owned. Hell, it wasn't long before our first date that the internet first caught on. So Jay and I lived a very different experience than the one Aziz Ansari speaks about in Modern Romance. And that's exactly why I think it was important for me to read it. While I haven't been single for almost two decades, a lot of my friends are. So it was really nice for me to get an insight into what it's like to date in 2015. You know, without the benefit of being able to write each other cutesy notes on actual paper during study hall.
It is fascinating all the ways in which technology has changed how people meet. And not only how they meet... who they meet. With the entire world at your fingertips, single people can hold out for their soulmate. But on the other hand, those people can also end perfectly happy, healthy relationships in case someone else better is out there. It's both a blessing and a curse. And I'm sure it's because I have a happy relationship that I'm thrilled that I never had to swipe right. But if I had been through fifteen years of shitty dates, I might be creating my eHarmony profile right now.
My favorite part of this book is the fact that it isn't the typical memoir of the life of a comedian. Ansari chose to use this platform to call attention to an interesting aspect of living in today's modern world. And these weren't just anecdotes. He hired and worked with well-respected researches, statistician's and sociologists. But his charts and graphs were interspersed with his own adorable personality and accessible wit. Thoroughly enjoyable and education!
Synopsis:
Now a "New York Times" Bestseller A hilarious, thoughtful, and in-depth exploration of thepleasures and perils of modern romance from one of this generation's sharpest comedic voices At some point, every one of us embarks on a journey to find love. We meet people, date, get into and out of relationships, all with the hope of finding someone with whom we share a deep connection. This seems standard now, but it?s wildly different from what people did even just decades ago. Single people today have more romantic options than at any point in human history. With technology, our abilities to connect with and sort through these options are staggering. So why are so many people frustrated? Some of our problems are unique to our time. “Why did this guy just text me an emoji of a pizza?? “Should I go out with this girl even though she listed Combos as one of her favorite snack foods? Combos?!? “My girlfriend just got a message from some dude named Nathan. Who?s Nathan? Did he just send her a photo of his penis? Should I check just to be sure?? But the transformation of our romantic lives can?t be explained by technology alone. In a short period of time, the whole culture of finding love has changed dramatically. A few decades ago, people would find a decent person who lived in their neighborhood. Their families would meet and, after deciding neither party seemed like a murderer, they would get married and soon have a kid, all by the time they were twenty-four. Today, people marry later than ever and spend years of their lives on a quest to find the perfect person, a soul mate. For years, Aziz Ansari has been aiming his comic insight at modern romance, but for Modern Romance, the book, he decided he needed to take things to another level. He teamed up with NYU sociologist Eric Klinenberg and designed a massive research project, including hundreds of interviews and focus groups conducted everywhere from Tokyo to Buenos Aires to Wichita. They analyzed behavioral data and surveys and created their own online research forum on Reddit, which drew thousands of messages. They enlisted the world?s leading social scientists, including Eli Finkel, Helen Fisher, Sheena Iyengar, Barry Schwartz, Sherry Turkle, and Robb Willer. The result is unlike any social science or humor book we?ve seen before. In Modern Romance, Ansari combines his irreverent humor with cutting-edge social science to give us an unforgettable tour of our new romantic world