Alienation from the workplace is common among people in our society today. We must work to earn a living, and not everyone is fortunate enough to work at a job that is their passion. As a result of settling for employment in a field that may not be enjoyable, people may become resentful, lose motivation or even become mentally unstable. This is evident in the movies “Fight Club” and “Office Space”. The characters from each movie loathe their jobs, and they start to take a toll on the characters and lead them to dangerous activities. Although these examples are portrayed in fiction, it is possible for jobs to lead people into regrettable actions in reality. In the movie “Bread and Roses”, a group of janitors are tired of being treated unfairly and given low wages. The janitors eventually go on strike and protest against their unequal circumstances.
From experience, I can say that I have worked with a number of people who dislike their jobs, and do not work to their full potential. I understand that the career at hand may have gotten dull for people, and that they still work in order to support their families, get health benefits and pay bills. However, if a person does not enjoy what they are doing, is it worth the stress and anxiety? In “Shop Class as Soulcraft”, the author, Matthew Crawford explains that people are alienated from their jobs because they have lost their sense of pride in what they do. Crawford states that a large part of this is because people have to settle for jobs in offices or commercial chains and they feel as if their work is meaningless.
In “Soulcraft”, Crawford’s main argument is that today’s society is lacking in people who are self reliant and could make their own things or fix appliances. We let...
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...we should forget about being alienated from our work as long as there are no factors against us. Unless a job is taking a toll on us for the worst as it might of done for the characters in “Office Space” or “Fight Club”, then it should not be a problem. So what if we have an annoying coworker or two, it’s worth putting up with knowing that we are getting paid to work, even if we find a job boring, we should have the sense in the back of our minds that “we have it easy”.
Works Cited
1. Crawford, Matthew B. Shop Class As Soulcraft. New York: Penguin, 2009. Print.
2. Hedges, Chris. Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt. New York, USA: Nation, 2012. Print.
3. Eidelson, Josh. "Fast Food Strikes Intensify in Seven Cities." Salon.com. N.p., 29 July 2013. Web.
4. Kucera, Barb. "Wal-Mart Has Perfected the Art of Union-Busting." Workday Minnesota. N.p., 26 Oct. 2008. Web.
Within an excerpt from, “The United States of Wal-Mart,” John Dicker explains that Wal-Mart is a troubling corporation. Dicker begins his article by discussing why the store is so popular within the news in an age of global terrorism, coming to the conclusion that Wal-Mart has a huge scope in the United States and that it has more scandals, lawsuits, and stories than any other supercenter. Continually, he goes on to explain that Wal-Mart outsources jobs and their companies demands makes it hard for employees to have livable wages and good working conditions. Furthermore, Dicker addresses the claim that Wal-Mart provides good jobs, by destroying this perception with statistics showing how employees live in poverty and that their union scene
Schlosser, Eric. Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. New York: Perennial, 2002.
“Out of every $1.50 spent on a large order of fries at fast food restaurant, perhaps 2 cents goes to the farmer that grew the potatoes,” (Schlosser 117). Investigative journalist Eric Schlosser brings to light these realities in his bestselling book, Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. Schlosser, a Princeton and Oxford graduate, is known for his inspective pieces for Atlantic Monthly. While working on article, for Rolling Stone Magazine, about immigrant workers in a strawberry field he acquired his inspiration for the aforementioned book, Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal, a work examining the country’s fast food industry (Gale).
Schlosser, Eric. Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2001. Print.
...ish Fast-Food Strikes | National Review Online." National Review Online. National Review Online, 5 Aug. 2013. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
People may wonder how this relates to transformational leadership. A leader that follows this theory is compassionate and caring towards the staff. An employee can’t love their job if they are fearful of their employer, or if they don’t agree with them. Here is where that quote comes into play. A person might love their career path, but that doesn’t mean they love their job. To be enjoyable, a job must have a happy work environment, and that includes a great and encouraging leader. Transformational leaders have high moral standards and values, and provide a vision and mission to their followers, thus followers have respect and admiration for their leader (Mittal & Dhar, 2015). If an employee feels that their leader cares about them, and wants the best for them, then that employee will enjoy going to work. If they enjoy going to work, then it won’t feel like their working, but instead will feel like they are doing what they love to do. This will allow the employee to go far beyond the normal expectations required of
People can learn to stand up for themselves or change a situation when someone or something at work has caused stress or unhappiness. A job challenge may get worse over time and usually doesn’t go away on its own. The sooner an individual begins to adapt in the situation, or in how he or she responds to it, the easier it will be to ...
“Don’t Blame the Eater” is an article by David Zinczenko that explains to Americans, specifically overweight young Americans, about the risks eating at fast food restaurants and its cause of affecting one’s health. In his article, he tries to address the issue about America’s food industries by using literal devices such as tone, logos, ethos, diction, and organization in order to spread his message. He begins his article by addressing the topic and as he continues writing, he supports his topic by writing about personal experience and moves onto the reasons why his topic in a serious issue. Although he shows an overall clear progress, he does tend to have a few problems with his writing that could be improved.
Works Cited Schlosser, Eric. A. Fast Food Nation. N. p. : Harper Perennial, 2001. Print.
A human being needs a few essential things to live happy and healthy according to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs which are: Self-actualization, esteem needs, social needs, security needs, and survival needs. Karl Marx introduced this in his passage as: alienation from self (losing your own identity) which is esteem needs, alienation from nature (completely forgetting that mother nature exists around us) which is survival needs, alienation of skill (having to leave behind your creativity and experience like they never existed) which is self actualization, and alienation from product (which means you did so little in its production that you’re just a little drop in the ocean) which is self- actualization. Believe it or not this still goes on today in most jobs. People don’t really look at it in that way we disguise it with the term “working for a living” but the truth is we make our own trap it is in the line we “live to work” some people haven’t really noticed but how often do you actually had time to do something for themselves, when was the last time you got home and the sun was still up, or actually went to a social gathering besides a club or a
In his study about psychological conditions of personal engagement and disengagement at work, Kahn have shown that there are three psychological engagement elements that can influence an individual’s behaviour in relation to their job function. The elements are 1) meaningfulness - rewards from engagement, 2) safety - higher willingness to engage, and 3) availability - readiness to engage (Kahn, 1990). Because of his work, Kahn is widely regarded as the pioneer of employee engagement and his findings are still engaged and found in many references about employee
One of these problems that occurs in work is alienation. Alienation is defined as, “The Sense of meaninglessness and powerlessness that people experience when interacting with social institutions they consider
Completing a task, whether it be mentally challenging or physically challenging, in order to reach a certain goal, is what defines work. When that work starts to bring in income for you, you can categorise that work as your career. Many people look at their job from a different angle in order to improve the satisfaction that they get from it. They try to find enjoyment out of their job in order to see it from a different angle and seek some enjoyment out of it. By definition, if you are getting any sort of pleasure from your work or you are completely satisfied with the way it’s going, if you are receiving income for the work then it cannot be considered as working. Throughout this essay, points will be made in order to back this up as well as stating ways in which pleasure can be found in your work by enforcing a positive workplace. By shining positive light into a workplace, we are able to increase the
Exhausted, bitter, and miserable is the way that many people feel when they wake up in the morning to get ready for work. Even the very thought of work puts some people in a bad mood. Others may not mind work but still do not look forward to going. It is a rare occasion to find someone who is completely satisfied with his or her career. However, for one man, work is bliss. In “Quality” by Galsworthy, Gessler, the shoemaker, is shown to be a man of integrity and of complete dedication to his work.
In every work place you will find employees who are happy with what they do and employees who are just there to complain and collect a paycheck. My topic for this discussion will cover job dissatisfaction.