A Book That Makes Me Want to Shout!

Speaking out

Read this book.  Period.  If you deal with introverts on a daily basis, read this book.  If you have a family member who is an introvert, read this book.  The book is Quiet:  The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking by Susan Cain.  As a life-long introverted "nerd" (or "geek" or "egghead"--only a few of the intellectual epithets hurtled at me through the years), I have found in this book a strong sense of affirmation, finally, that I'm not weird. I, as well as other introverts, am different from the extroverts who look at introverts as if they're from a different world. We are from a different world; we are nourished by the world that lives in our heads. Extroverts just don't seem to "get it."

For too long, introverts have been characterized as weird and counterproductive in a society that rewards the talker, the shouter, the person with the most Facebook "friends," and the braggart.  This bias has left many introverts either (a) withdrawing permanently from society to a quiet place, or (b) effecting an extrovert facade so they can "pass" in the extrovert world.  If an introvert does (b), they must also do  (a)--at least sometimes-- or face serious health and emotional consquences.

Like the lawyer that she was, Cain builds her case for the legitimazation of introversion as an acceptable personality mode.  She cites new interpretations of existing research, new functional MRI (fMRI) research findings, as well as personal anecdotes in support of her thesis.  As a person whose careers (I'm on my third) required high levels of social interaction, I found the story of Harvard professor Little especially salient (an introvert who teaching style is extroverted).  I, too, am "passing" as an extrovert.  Like Little, I can maintain the extrovert facade for a time, but must have silence to recharge. 

I am left wondering how this does pertain to education.  While anyone who thinks that the purpose of education is to produce industrial workers is just NOT paying attention, the encroachment of business theory into education is undeniable.  Cooperative learning is championed because the "research" affirms the practice and, coincidentally, that's how business is perceived to work.  (It doesn't really work that way in my experience.)  Educators may give lip service to the value of individual achievement, but loud, busy classrooms, coupled with a near-abandonment of homework (hopefully done in a quiet environment), leave the introverted students in a state of frustration.  I do believe in the value of multi-sensory, active learning, but, as an introverted student, I often found myself wishing the teachers and other students would just leave me alone so I could explore, process, and synthesize the subjects at hand.  When can the introverts in the classroom do that???????

As much as I am bolstered by her argument, I find its logic a bit too simplistic in the sense that she ascribes to introverts an intellectual bent that I don't always see.  She claims that introverts seek out intellectual and emotion intimacy, but many seem to have given up hope of finding it.  She also seems to treat extroverts as more shallow than I've experienced.

So, I'm sharing this book with my friends and family.  The introverts need the affirmation, and, maybe the extroverts will finally acknowledge that the introverts actually need the quiet time they so desperately avoid.

See Susan Cain's TED talk here.