In this interactive talk and book-signing at the venerable Brownell Library, Maggie Jackson discusses  why we’re failing to solve one of the most pressing problems of our time: the fragmentation of attention that is eroding our abilities to problem-solve, innovate, and care for one another.

Jackson will draw from the new updated 2018 edition of her acclaimed classic Distracted: Reclaiming Our Focus in a World of Lost Attention.

The first edition of Distracted was compared by Fast Company to Silent Spring for its far-sighted warnings of our current crisis of inattention. With a preface by Bill McKibben, the book sparked a global conversation on the steep costs of tech-induced distraction. Now Jackson’s work is “more essential than ever,” according to Nicholas Carr.

 Jackson will discuss how we can at last harness the technological marvels of our age and turn data into knowledge and distraction into skillful attention. We must, Jackson argues, curb technological excess by cultivating the full gamut of our attentional capabilities. We must look first to the human behind the device.