Bunk: The Rise of Hoaxes, Humbug, Plagiarists, Phonies, Post-Facts, And Fake News
by Kevin Young
Buy on AmazonTraces the history of the hoax as a distinct American phenomenon, exploring the roles of stereotype, suspicion, and racism as factors that have shaped fraudulent activities from the heyday of P.T. Barnum through the "fake news" activities of Donald Trump.
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"It’s no secret that America is going through a fake news moment. There are people in this country who continue to believe that Barack Obama was born in Kenya and that Sept. 11 was an inside job. In Bunk, New Yorker poetry editor Kevin Young explores America’s obsession with falsehoods. He tells NPR that there’s something particularly American about hoaxes. “There is, in our culture, this notion of you can become anything, you can change,” he says. “And I think that gets intertwined with the hoax.”"
NPR Books We Love — 2017 · apps.npr.org