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The Problem with Work: Feminism, Marxism, Antiwork Politics, and Postwork Imaginaries (A John Hope Franklin Center Book) - Hardcover
In The Problem with Work, Kathi Weeks boldly challenges the presupposition that work, or waged labor, is inherently a social and political good. While progressive political movements, including the Marxist and feminist movements, have fought for equal pay, better work conditions, and the recognition of unpaid work as a valued form of labor, even they have tended to accept work as a naturalized or inevitable activity. Weeks argues that in taking work as a given, we have "depoliticized" it, or removed it from the realm of political critique. Employment is now largely privatized, and work-based activism in the United States has atrophied. We have accepted waged work as the primary mechanism for income distribution, as an ethical obligation, and as a means of defining ourselves and others as social and political subjects. Taking up Marxist and feminist critiques, Weeks proposes a postwork society that would allow people to be productive and creative rather than relentlessly bound to the employment relation. Work, she contends, is a legitimate, even crucial, subject for political theory.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
Review:
"Finally, a well-reasoned and critical treatise on the nature of work has appeared that grapples with the work ethic and wrestles it into submission." - The Right to Be Lazy blog
"Put another way, The Problem with Work ... raise[s] key issues for feminism, including the question of whether capitalism can serve the interests of women today and in the future... Th[is book] should be widely read, discussed, and debated..." - Julie P. Torrant, Signs
"The Problem with Work is one of the most exciting and original works of social theory that I have read in a great many years. Kathi Weeks's argument is daring and extremely well executed, and her book is remarkable for its clarity, compulsive readability, and insightful synthesis of critical social theories. This is a truly wonderful book."--Judith Grant, author of Fundamental Feminism: Contesting the Core Concepts of Feminist Theory
"Kathi Weeks's excellent book shows us that the project to build a postwork society is a feminist project, one that understands that the real liberation of labor must be the liberation from labor."--Antonio Negri, author of The Labor of Job: The Biblical Text as a Parable of Human Labor
"Less work or better work? Should alienated labor be a focus of political economic critique or is it more important to question the centrality of work to life and productivity to self-worth? Kathi Weeks builds a feminist political theory of work from these questions. The result is a provocative argument that not only sheds new light on second-wave feminism by putting the 1970s demand for wages for housework in dialogue with autonomist Marxism but reminds that tradition of its debts to feminist theory and activism."--Lisa Disch, University of Michigan
"There's no better way to spend the summer months than by thinking about waged labor, which is why I'm currently reading The Problem with Work, an inventive examination of how seemingly reformist measures such as universal basic income and reduced workweeks can be used as stepping stones toward a world beyond the daily grind."--Frank Reynolds "The Nation "
"[Weeks] convincingly shows how an imperative to be productive, at work, in the home, school and in life generally ('Five Top Tips for Productive Dating Profiles!'), is central to the way capitalism not only puts us to work but makes us want to be put to work. We think work is right and just and when we imagine another world, even a 'post-revolutionary world', we imagine a world of work. Weeks argues that we need to break the hold that work has on our imaginations."--Nicholas Beuret "Red Pepper "
"The Problem with Work ... raise[s] key issues for feminism, including the question of whether capitalism can serve the interests of women today and in the future... Th[is book] should be widely read, discussed, and debated..."--Julie P. Torrant "Signs "
"The Problem with Work . . . is bold for several reasons. Not the least of which is for its fundamental argument that work should be understood as a concern of political theory, that work is a matter of power and domination as much as it is productivity and economics. This academic provocation aside, Weeks' book is bold in taking up the critique of work, in claiming anti-work politics. In doing so it breaks both with the dominant ideology that makes work a testament to one's moral worth and with the center-left contestation of this ideology that demands more aggressive jobs programs to put people to work."--Unemployed Negativity blog
"[T]his is well worth a read, as Weeks presents a set of imaginative and insightful ideas in a clear and thoroughly argued format."--Ruth Lorimer "Socialist Review "
About the Author:
"Put another way, The Problem with Work ... raise[s] key issues for feminism, including the question of whether capitalism can serve the interests of women today and in the future... Th[is book] should be widely read, discussed, and debated..." - Julie P. Torrant, Signs
"The Problem with Work is one of the most exciting and original works of social theory that I have read in a great many years. Kathi Weeks's argument is daring and extremely well executed, and her book is remarkable for its clarity, compulsive readability, and insightful synthesis of critical social theories. This is a truly wonderful book."--Judith Grant, author of Fundamental Feminism: Contesting the Core Concepts of Feminist Theory
"Kathi Weeks's excellent book shows us that the project to build a postwork society is a feminist project, one that understands that the real liberation of labor must be the liberation from labor."--Antonio Negri, author of The Labor of Job: The Biblical Text as a Parable of Human Labor
"Less work or better work? Should alienated labor be a focus of political economic critique or is it more important to question the centrality of work to life and productivity to self-worth? Kathi Weeks builds a feminist political theory of work from these questions. The result is a provocative argument that not only sheds new light on second-wave feminism by putting the 1970s demand for wages for housework in dialogue with autonomist Marxism but reminds that tradition of its debts to feminist theory and activism."--Lisa Disch, University of Michigan
"There's no better way to spend the summer months than by thinking about waged labor, which is why I'm currently reading The Problem with Work, an inventive examination of how seemingly reformist measures such as universal basic income and reduced workweeks can be used as stepping stones toward a world beyond the daily grind."--Frank Reynolds "The Nation "
"[Weeks] convincingly shows how an imperative to be productive, at work, in the home, school and in life generally ('Five Top Tips for Productive Dating Profiles!'), is central to the way capitalism not only puts us to work but makes us want to be put to work. We think work is right and just and when we imagine another world, even a 'post-revolutionary world', we imagine a world of work. Weeks argues that we need to break the hold that work has on our imaginations."--Nicholas Beuret "Red Pepper "
"The Problem with Work ... raise[s] key issues for feminism, including the question of whether capitalism can serve the interests of women today and in the future... Th[is book] should be widely read, discussed, and debated..."--Julie P. Torrant "Signs "
"The Problem with Work . . . is bold for several reasons. Not the least of which is for its fundamental argument that work should be understood as a concern of political theory, that work is a matter of power and domination as much as it is productivity and economics. This academic provocation aside, Weeks' book is bold in taking up the critique of work, in claiming anti-work politics. In doing so it breaks both with the dominant ideology that makes work a testament to one's moral worth and with the center-left contestation of this ideology that demands more aggressive jobs programs to put people to work."--Unemployed Negativity blog
"[T]his is well worth a read, as Weeks presents a set of imaginative and insightful ideas in a clear and thoroughly argued format."--Ruth Lorimer "Socialist Review "
Kathi Weeks is Associate Professor of Women's Studies at Duke University. She is the author of Constituting Feminist Subjects and a co-editor of The Jameson Reader.
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
- PublisherDuke University Press
- Publication date2011
- ISBN 10 0822350963
- ISBN 13 9780822350965
- BindingHardcover
- Number of pages304
- Rating
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The Problem with Work: Feminism, Marxism, Antiwork Politics, and Postwork Imaginaries (a John Hope Franklin Center Book)
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Duke University Press Books
(2011)
ISBN 10: 0822350963
ISBN 13: 9780822350965
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Book Description Hardcover. Condition: Good. HARDCOVER Good - Bumped and creased book with tears to the extremities, but not affecting the text block, may have remainder mark or previous owner's name - GOOD Standard-sized. Seller Inventory # M0822350963Z3
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