Hello, Stranger cover art

Hello, Stranger

How We Find Connection in a Disconnected World

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Hello, Stranger

By: Will Buckingham
Narrated by: Mark Peachey
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About this listen

We navigate our interactions with strangers according to a host of unwritten rules, rituals and (sometimes awkward) attempts at politeness. But what if the people we meet were not a problem, but a gift?

When philosopher and traveller Will Buckingham’s partner died, he sought solace in throwing open the door to new people. Now, as we reflect on our experiences of the pandemic and its enforced separations, and as global migration figures ever more prominently in our collective future, Buckingham brings together insights from philosophy, anthropology, history and literature to explore how our traditions of meeting the other can mitigate the issues of our time. How do we set aside our instinctive xenophobia - fear of outsiders - and embrace our equally natural philoxenia - love of strangers and newness?

Taking in stories of loneliness, exile and friendship from classical times to the modern day and alighting in adapting communities from Myanmar to Birmingham, Hello, Stranger offers an endlessly curious, uplifting and powerful antidote to our increasingly atomised world.

©2021 Will Buckingham (P)2021 W. F. Howes Ltd
Customs & Traditions Social Sciences Sociology World Tradition

Critic Reviews

"A glorious book, fabulously learned and funny, and filled with all manner of stirring stories." (Philip Marsden, author of The Summer Isles)

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In the spirit of reconciliation, Audible acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.