Entry three: Matthew Crawford - The Case for Working with Your Hands

In the Chapter 'The Separation of Thinking from Doing' from Matthew Crawford's 'The Case for Working with Your Hands', he offers an overview of how the disassociation of individual thought and action has led to the degradation of work.

This entry addresses how over the course of the twentieth century, workers have become a cog within a machine, easily replaceable by allowing 'craftsmanship' to die by dividing all work into smaller processes. We are now channelled into office cubicles or factory lines and the human brain is prohibited from fully engaging.

'The Wheelwright' example describes how the worker has a complex and rewarding job to do as he feel stye natural kinks in the wood, no piece of wood is the same as the next, he has to listen to his material and feel how to work it. This is craftsmanship, no wheel he makes is the same as the next and a  machine can do this same job.

Corporations took over central control of 'the machine' and forced the workers into being 'standardised parts'. Implementing this and changing the workforce from being 'craftsmen' to being just a small part of the process comes across to me as very sinister. It diminishes job satisfaction and leads to everyone being and feeling completely disposable.