Talking About Work and Play (on a Saturday)

The book had a catchy title: Shop Class as Soul Craft. Never having been particularly talented at shop class but interested in "soul" stuff I wondered what Matthew Crawford had in mind. The subtitle: An Inquiry Into the Value of Work took it a little further. So I checked it out of the library.

Interesting premise. Crawford in a post-modern philosophy takes a step back into a world of craft and careful, care-filled manufacturing. He takes to task the western, capitalist corporate soul-less developments in manufacturing. He takes to task as well the Communist government controlled soul-less developments. At times I wanted to call him a post-Communist Marxist.

What gives him the credentials to do this? He is a PhD philosopher and thinker. And he owns a motorcycle repair shop doing true soul craft on engines. He uses his growth and experiences as a mechanic to highlight what he is talking about.

Through this he sets up several ideas that he works through:

• Leisure -vs- work
• Work -vs- vocation
• Meaning in work
• Soul craft in work

Work that is soul craft has to point outward

to, or serves, some more comprehensive understanding of the good life

than making money, or leisure, or whatever. He also says that

to be capable of sustaining our interest a job has to have room for progress in excellence.

So I pondered, what is work, vocation, soul craft. One thing came through that it is possible to lose one's my soul in any work, even "good" work. There has to be a sense of meaning and purpose, which Crawford makes clear he believes can be found in good, old-fashioned craftsmanship and careful manufacturing. As a critique of mass-manufacturing or collectivism he challenges some now deeply instilled values.

I am not a philosopher. As you all know I am more of a story-teller and I most appreciated his telling of his story. It illustrated the idea. But at the heart of the book is the challenge to find, in work, the same sense of growth and possibility that we often attempt to find in play. After all, why can't we find in work the same joy as we find in not-work?

Which led me back to a quite I found in another book from this past year, William Alexander's Hi, I'm Bill and I'm Old.

There are many things in life that will catch your eye, but only a few will catch your heart. Pursue those.

--William Alexander, Hi, I'm Bill and I'm Old. Hazelden, 2008.