{"title":"Dan Bouk","description":"\u003cp\u003eDelve into the insightful works of Dan Bouk, where history meets social analysis. Perfect for readers intrigued by the hidden stories behind data, bureaucracy, and the evolution of modern life. Browse now!\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"how-our-days-became-numbered-book-dan-bouk-9780226259178","title":"How Our Days Became Numbered","description":"Long before the age of \"Big Data\" or the rise of today's \"self-quantifiers,\" American capitalism embraced \"risk\"- and proceeded to number our days. Life insurers led the way, developing numerical practices for measuring individuals and groups, predicting their fates, and intervening in their futures. Emanating from the gilded boardrooms of Lower Manhattan and making their way into drawing rooms and tenement apartments across the nation, these practices soon came to change the futures they purported to divine. How Our Days Became Numbered tells a story of corporate culture remaking American culture - a story of intellectuals and professionals in and around insurance companies who reimagined Americans' lives through numbers and taught ordinary Americans to do the same. Making individuals statistical did not happen easily. Legislative battles raged over the propriety of discriminating by race or of smoothing away the effects of capitalism's fluctuations on individuals. Meanwhile, debates within companies set doctors against actuaries and agents, resulting in elaborate, secretive systems of surveillance and calculation. Dan Bouk reveals how, in a little over half a century, insurers laid the groundwork for the much-quantified, risk-infused world that we live in today. To understand how the financial world shapes modern bodies, how risk assessments can perpetuate inequalities of race or sex, and how the quantification and claims of risk on each of us continue to grow, we must take seriously the history of those who view our lives as a series of probabilities to be managed.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49573858214161,"sku":"GOR008673959","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/022625917X.jpg?v=1750738059"},{"product_id":"democracy-s-data-book-dan-bouk-9780374602543","title":"Democracy's Data","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eONE OF \u003ci\u003eTHE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW\u003c\/i\u003e'S 100 NOTABLE BOOKS OF 2022\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eFrom the historian Dan Bouk, a lesson in reading between the lines of the U.S. census to uncover the stories behind the data.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e The census isn't just a data-collection process; it's a ritual, and a tool, of American democracy. Behind every neat grid of numbers is a collage of messy, human stories--you just have to know how to read them.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e In \u003ci\u003eDemocracy's Data\u003c\/i\u003e, the data historian Dan Bouk examines the 1940 U.S. census, uncovering what those numbers both condense and cleverly abstract: a universe of meaning and uncertainty, of cultural negotiation and political struggle. He introduces us to the men and women employed as census takers, bringing us with them as they go door to door, recording the lives of their neighbors. He takes us into the makeshift halls of the Census Bureau, where hundreds of civil servants, not to mention machines, labored with pencil and paper to divide and conquer the nation's data. And he uses these little points to paint bigger pictures, such as of the ruling hand of white supremacy, the place of queer people in straight systems, and the struggle of ordinary people to be seen by the state as they see themselves.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e The 1940 census is a crucial entry in American history, a controversial dataset that enabled the creation of New Deal era social programs, but that also, with the advent of World War Two, would be weaponized against many of the citizens whom it was supposed to serve. In our age of quantification, \u003ci\u003eDemocracy's Data\u003c\/i\u003e not only teaches us how to read between the lines but gives us a new perspective on the relationship between representation, identity, and governance today.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49611387470097,"sku":"GOR012980912","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50467874930961,"sku":"CIN0374602549G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51415734911249,"sku":"CIN0374602549VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0374602549.jpg?v=1751197036"},{"product_id":"how-our-days-became-numbered-book-dan-bouk-9780226564869","title":"How Our Days Became Numbered","description":"Explains how life insurance corporations shaped how we understand American life spans and Americans as risks","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":49726372249873,"sku":"NGR9780226564869","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50105114165521,"sku":"GOR013857401","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51000250171665,"sku":"NIN9780226564869","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":52103230914833,"sku":"CIN022656486XVG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/022656486X.jpg?v=1750843658"},{"product_id":"democracy-s-data-book-dan-bouk-9781250872173","title":"Democracy's Data","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eFrom the historian Dan Bouk, a lesson in reading between the lines of the U.S. census to uncover the stories behind the data.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e The census isn't simply data; it's a ritual of American democracy. 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