Feyn's Sunday Reads | Week 3
Shop Class As Soulcraft by Matthew Crawford
The subtitle, "an inquiry into the value of work," is an homage to Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance ("an inquiry into values"), and sums up the central theme of the book well. Published in 2009 (with brief references to the then-recent financial crisis), it examines the nature of work: what makes some work fulfilling and enjoyable and what makes other work soul-crushing and dull. There is also consideration for the economics of work, with prescient predictions on the future stability of certain types of blue collar work versus white collar work, long before viable AI.
"The time is ripe to dwell on this unease rather than dismiss it. The scope of the economic crisis is still uncertain as I write this, but it appears to be deepening... Out of the current confusion of ideals and confounding of career hopes, a calm recognition may yet emerge that productive labor is the foundation of all prosperity. The meta-work of trafficking in the surplus skimmed from other people's work suddenly appears as what it is, and it becomes possible once again to think the thought, 'let me make myself useful.'"
