Gloria Origgi, “Reputation: What it is and Why it Matters” (Princeton UP, 2018)

New Books in Sociology · Apr 2, 2018 · 1h

We all put a great deal of care into protecting, managing, and monitoring our reputation. But the precise nature of a reputation is obscure. In one sense, reputation is merely hearsay, a popular perception that may or may not have any basis in fact. Yet we rely heavily on reputations for example, when were choosing a restaurant, mechanic, or physician. Accordingly, multiple sites on social media are devoted to helping us to discover the reputation of service providers, social events, and even people. Still, reputation can be manipulated. Is it rational to care so much about reputation? In…