Overview
The lecture introduces Dollar Street, a Gapminder project that uses photos of real families worldwide, organized by income, to challenge cultural stereotypes and highlight similarities in daily life.
What is Dollar Street?
- Dollar Street is a visual database showing how families live at different income levels globally.
- It features thousands of photos and videos from homes in many countries, sorted by monthly income.
- The project aims to reduce stereotypes by letting viewers compare everyday items across cultures and incomes.
How Dollar Street Works
- Over 460 families from more than 67 countries are documented.
- Families are arranged left to right by income, from poorest to richest.
- Each home is photographed in detail, showing living conditions, possessions, and daily life.
- Users can browse homes by country or income level to see global patterns and differences.
Key Insights & Takeaways
- People’s lives are more similar than what stereotypes suggest, especially when viewed through income rather than nationality.
- Material differences between homes are often related to income, not country or ethnicity.
- Visualizing data with photographs makes global comparisons more relatable and tangible.
Participation and Growth
- Dollar Street continues to expand, inviting contributions from underrepresented regions.
- Resources are available for anyone interested in documenting homes and contributing to the project.
Key Terms & Definitions
- Dollar Street — A Gapminder project displaying photos of homes worldwide, organized by income to compare living standards.
- Stereotype — An oversimplified, generalized belief about a group of people.
- Income level — The amount of money a family earns per month, used to categorize homes on Dollar Street.
Action Items / Next Steps
- Visit the Dollar Street website to explore families’ homes by income and country.
- Consider contributing to Dollar Street by documenting a home from a less-represented area.
- Reflect on how economic status, not nationality, shapes daily living conditions worldwide.