Research Catalog

Title

Breaking things at work : the Luddites are right about why you hate your job / Gavin Mueller.

Author

Mueller, Gavin

Publication

• London ; New York : Verso, an imprint of New Left Books, 2021.
• ©2021

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

viii, 168 pages; 21 cm

Summary

"In the nineteenth century, English textile workers responded to the introduction of new technologies on the factory floor by smashing them to bits. For years the Luddites roamed the English countryside, practicing drills and maneuvers that they would later deploy on unsuspecting machines. The movement has been derided by scholars as a backwards-looking and ultimately ineffectual effort to stem the march of history; for Gavin Mueller, the movement gets at the heart of the antagonistic relationship between all workers, including us today, and the so-called progressive gains secured by new technologies. The Luddites weren't primitive and they are still a force, however unconsciously, in the workplaces of the twenty-first century world. Breaking Things at Work is an innovative rethinking of labor and machines, leaping from textile mills to algorithms, from existentially threatened knife cutters of rural Germany to surveillance-evading truckers driving across the continental United States. Mueller argues that the future stability and empowerment of working-class movements will depend on subverting these technologies and preventing their spread wherever possible. The task is intimidating, but the seeds of this resistance are already present in the neo-Luddite efforts of hackers, pirates, and dark web users who are challenging surveillance and control, often through older systems of communication technology"--

Subject

• Technology > Social aspects
• Luddites

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references ([137]-158) and index.

Contents

Introduction -- The nights of King Ludd -- Tinkerers, taylors, soldiers, wobs -- Against automation -- High-tech Luddism -- Conclusion.

Call Number

JFD 21-1712

ISBN

• 9781786636775
• 1786636778

OCLC

1180020232

Author

Mueller, Gavin, author.

Title

Breaking things at work : the Luddites are right about why you hate your job / Gavin Mueller.

Publisher

London ; New York : Verso, an imprint of New Left Books, 2021.

Copyright Date

©2021

Type of Content

text

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references ([137]-158) and index.

Research Call Number

JFD 21-1712