...Life Is Like a Box of Chocolates…

Group tasks: How did life change before and after the industrial revolution?

2009-03-24T04:43:00.000-07:00

Before the Industrial Revolution all work was done by hand, or perhaps with the assistance of a horse or buffalo. People lived close to their work and their farms.

The opening of factories, mines, steam engines and railroads meant that people could produce more yet work fewer hours. They were able to move off farms and into towns. Society moved from a system that still used bartering to one that depended more on cash.

THE SOCIOLOGICAL ASPECT OF WORK

Grint defines work like a social activity. But we can say that in the Pre- Industrial period work concerned just the family and sometimes the neighbours but it was the only sociological aspect. While in Post Industrial Era Work becomes something based on world social relationships, because this is the time in which work get in MARKET, the world one.

References to the text:

1) Role of women

Before the industrial revolution the women were expected to work on the land together with the rest of the family and workmen. During the revolution, the women were not allowed in the factories. The housewife was being created. The breadwinners were more important in society. Later on we notice that women and children could work in factories, in the so called non-heavy labour factories like cotton factories were they had to handle the machines. Mostly this was because the men were expected to go to work and the factories needed labour forces. When the men returned form the war it was a quite difficult time at the household. Because the women had taken over the work of the men and they had been prven to be equal. Now all of a sudden they have to give up that. (references to the movie DAENS)

Grint: THE WAR p.3

Today in Post Industrial Era the WAR doesn’t change your life, your work. We aren’t involved in War.

Besides that we also see a that before we had the Country Woman and now we have the City Woman.

The city wife has to do two things, when her husband comes back from work and he was being abusedat work she has to comfort him as well and do her home tasks.

References Grint: THE DIVISION OF WORK

P.10 and the movie: Modern Times- Charlie Chaplin

Pre Industrial: No specialization everyone can help the family and can do the work.

Industrial: a scientific strict specialisation

2) Family structure

Like said before the entire family was expected to work on the land. The family lived within the property. When the revolution started we see that the men move to the big cities to work in the factory, were they were promised good working conditions and a good salary for that time. The rest of the family stayed home to work on the land.

3) Urban city - City move (urbanisation)

When the industrial revolution really set forward, we see that the entire family moved to the cities and left their country homes to go and live in poor living conditions at the city. They all lived in what we call industrial towns. The big city movement started. We also noticed that from this moment on the factories were employing as well men as women and even children.

4) Children at work

Children were being used in the factories as well. Although this wasn’t allowed by the government, it was something natural. The children had to work for their families so they could pay all the bills and buy food. They were required to do the small, little things at the factories, were hired to clean the chimneys and others.

5) Machinery

The coming up of the machinery made that also women could start working at the factories to handle them. The machines replaced the labour of the men, whom the employees had to pay much. The women were loved at that time, because the employees didn’t had to pay them that much as men, because they were considered as less worth working powers. Therefore the men could go back home and work on their land with also newly invented machinery to make the hard work lighter.

6) 9 to 5 work

When as before the people went to work on the land at random times, a set working time was being set. The well-know 9 to 5 work was being set. This structured the lives of the people during that time.

Grint: THE IDEA OF TIME

7) Agriculture => capitalism

The most important thing is that a life of agriculture was being replaced by one that consisted of capitalism and industrial work.

8) FROM OWNER TO SLAVES

Pre-industrial: This is mine, I work for something that it’s my propriety.

Industrial: I work for someone that works for someone else. I can lose my job.

9) FROM PRODUCERS&CONSUMERS TO PRODUCERS WITHOUT POSSIBILITY TO CONSUME PRODUCTS.

10) PUBLIC AND PPRIVATE SPHERE p.20

Pre-industrial: The private and the public sphere stayed together.

Industrial: a strict separation from Public arena in which the worker is exploited, alienated from himself, his personality, and the Private arena in which He is angry, sad, he vents his frustrations from the public arena and in which he can’t have and can’t enjoy prizes for his work.

11) THE TRADE UNION’S NEED

During the Industrial Revolution with all changes that it’s involved, Workers started to feel the need to create trade unions against capitalists.

Pre Industrial: NO COMMON CONSCIOUSNESS because No common problems.

Industrial: The born of a common consciousness against the Common exploitation.

FUNNY PICS !

2009-03-23T04:01:00.001-07:00

JoBCentre

COFFE ADDICTION

The Idea of our personal computer for the 2004 year!

Househousband =)

...and MANAGER WOMAN!

"I have found a job at the JobCentre!"
"Really?And What are you doing?"
"I sell drinks and food for people in queue!"

"Today our computers are down !!!We have to do everthing manually!"

Individual task:How work changed Society after Industrial Revolution? PART II

2009-03-21T08:54:00.000-07:00

CHILD

In the past Child have every worked;before helping the family in countries and during The Industrial Revolution they were employed in many factories as well as the woman, because It was easier for factories’ owners to exploit them with no regulation about payment and labour’s hours.
Child labour laws made it against the law for children to work full-time jobs on farms, in factories, or in businesses. There were laws protecting children in some states as early as the 1830’s. These laws were often overlooked however, or ignored all together.After the census of 1900, social reformers were able to convince lawmakers to make new laws and enforce those that were already in place.
How work changed Child's condition from the Eighteen century to Twenty-one ?

1800\1850 Child at Work.. Countries and Factory

1860 Finally Child at schools
(Picture on the left from "Cuore"-E.De Amicis)
After the Economic Boom from Industrial Revolution,Governments and Parents Found out the Importance of The School.
The social mobility dream begins....

The New Century
In few time the World is Changed.
Speed is the Key-Word.
Everyone has to work.
The World is faster than before.
The ClockTime is something to chase.
And What about our children?

A New Model for Them?

How we can find

solutions?!

Individual Task:How work changed Society after Industrial Revolution?

2009-03-21T07:11:00.000-07:00

The Industrial Revolution was a period in the late 18th and early 19th centuries when major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, production, mining, and transportation had a profound effect on the socioeconomic and cultural conditions in all the world.

How work changed our Society?

Is it possible to reconstruct an history line from Industrial Revolution’s Era till today using pictures?

URBANISATION
London-1800

During the Industrial Revolution there was an incredible Urbanisation:People moved into cities to seek economic opportunities. In rural areas, often on small family farms, it was difficult to improve one's standard of living beyond basic sustenance. Farm living was dependent on unpredictable environmental conditions, and in times of drought, flood or pestilence, survival became extremely problematic.

Cities, in contrast, were where fortunes were made and where social mobility was possible: In fact millions of family moved from countries to cities in which The Industrial Revolution was becoming with her factories, her new jobs, her progress' perspective.

London 1910

New building and affluent development went hand in hand with horribly overcrowded slums where people lived in the worst conditions imaginable. The population surged during the 19th century, from about 1 million in 1800 to over 6 million a century later. This growth far exceeded London's ability to look after the basic needs of its citizens.

The terrific population growth of the late Victorian period continued into the 20th century. In 1904 the first motor bus service in London began, followed by the first underground electric train in 1906, but perhaps more notable was the spate of new luxury hotels, department stores, and new theatres.

London 1950

The Industrial Revolution has set in motion an incredible process that it's not possible to stop. POWER, PROGRESS, MONEY are the Key-World from 18th century until today.

London,Today.In just fifty years.

..When WORK meets POETRY..

2009-03-08T14:56:00.000-07:00

Toads- Philip Larkin (1922_85), 1955

In this poem Larking calls work something as repulsive as a toad. He wishes to get rid of its clutches. The work has killed his creativity and he feels imprisoned. Larkin rues the fact that he does not have the courage to quit the job because he fears insecurity. He is afraid of losing the comforts of his present life.

“ Just for paying a few bills”

Larking looks very pessimistic to work because through this poem he says that work isn’t a factor that helps in self-realisation, but in fact makes the worker suffer from his condition.

Therefore Philip Larkin explains the same idea of Grint. Namely in his book Grint explains the theory of Marx: “The capitalism inverted the world of work and turned it against him”.

Expressing that the worker feels locked up in the world of work and like said before suffers from it.

Grint also refers to Work and Christianity in his book. In the poem we find the following back:

“I don’t say, one bodies the other

One spiritual truth "

Where Larking tries to involve Christianity in his poem.

Grint and Power and work:

He describes that work empowers the workers. Larkin describes just the same thing in his poem when he sais that “the worker is a slave of himself”.

When we have a look at the language being used in the poem, we see a lot of onomatopoeic words being used. Toads – squats – nippers – whippet, are all words that refer to animalism. We find this back in Grint when he is talking about the power of the employers over the employees. They feel like animals because they are treated that way.

You will be hearing from us Shortly – U.A. Fanthorpe (1929 -), 1982

It is not the poet simply trying to depict a cruel Dickensian employer- she is judging herself; society- questioning how we judge ourselves and each other!

As we found out through reading some extra background of the poet her life, we noticed that she is a real feminist.

During the time when she wrote the poem, it was very hard for women to find work. Unemployment was high underneath the female gender.

As we read in Mallia Mallia it was being said that the women didn’t care much for work after schooling. Their job was to take care of the family and that the men should go to work.

She is implying that whenever the women went for a job interview, that it is a lot more harder on them to qualify. Women should stand up to these procedures and take the right to work as well, besides the housework.

We assume that she is defending herself and her profession/ qualifications too. We don’t know whether her being a writer was being excepted in that time.

Moreover we don’t know whether she is talking about a woman or a man in her poem. But because of her background and the words being used in the poem we consider it to be a female.

References to Grint we say that the work became life. (The employer asks things about (her) the employee’s life.)

ð Qualities, qualifications, immaturity, looks, appearance, accent, education

ð The person asks during the interview (job interview) a lot about his personal life. So work and personal life are being mixed

In Grint’s introduction we read that there are 4 areas, 4 assumptions that that guide all the book. The first one (The denial of the supremacy of labour process, separated from home and all else) is contra dictionary with this poem.

We find this is a humorous poem with a serious point. It explores the numerous reasons why people are found unsuitable for the jobs they have applied for. The speaker of the poem is the employer (who stands for all employers) who addresses the interviewee. The poem proceeds by way of a number of questions, the kind that are asked at interview. The interviewee, however, never answers - the implication is that the interviewee is powerless. The tone of voice used is rather pompous and patronising. The employer will find any excuse not to give the applicant a job - their age, education, appearance, even the fact that they were ever born. We suppose the poem has an underlying sympathy for those who cannot find a job and that employers can always find a reason for rejecting someone.

Therefore it refers to almost the entire first chapter of Grint’s book. To name a few main titles, power and work, unemployment, work and social class…

The chimney- Sweeper’s Complaint by Mary Alcock (neé Cumberland) (c.1742-98)

Starting wit references to Grint we see that in complaint we have work and power:

“Yet still my master makes me work.”

The worker in this poem is being treated like an animal. He is sore all over the place but still he has to continuum to work for his master.

Something else we find back in the poem Grint mentioned we trace back on page 9, Historical rhetorics of work: views from above and below, is that in this case the word ‘work’ is like the Hebrew significance, avodah, what means slave.

We consider that the body of the sweeper is a symbol for the work he’s doing.

If we think back in history we know that infants were being used and even abused to do this kind of work. They were small, little and fitted through the chimney.

Therefore we think that the child talks to us through this poem.

On page 10 Grint refers to work as a word coming from all sorts of languages. Work means work, pain and the absence of freedom. We definitely see the noun pain coming back in this poem.

The author describes children’s work very critical.

Work By D.H. Laurence (1885-1930), 1929

Again we see Work and power coming back. On page 15 Grint refers to Hegel on work. We also see something what as Grint mentioned as Work and social class. We read about poor people live in poor living conditions, while the rich ones take advantage of it.

When we think of Marx’s critics to Capitalism, we can find it back in the poem when we read that the worker he has to produce goods and then he even has to pay for his own produces, to be able to use them (cups, plates, …). We see this on page 16 and further (Marx on work)

For Marx, capitalism inverted the world of work and turned it against the workers, thereby not just preventing them from realisation themselves but actually developing a system through which work became the source of anti-humanism, the origin of alienation and exploitation…

…Marx’s schema for the future of society counter posed an uneasy alliance between self-managed producer units and centrally co-ordinated social planning…

We can say that from this poem it’s clear that the same critical view of work comes in Marx perception on work.

The date when the poem was written is very important because the peot lived between the first and second world war and 1929 is right before the Economical crisis in America.

Everyone had to work, had to be employed. In the poem the worker first was happy to go to work and then you can see the consequence, namely depression and all sort of these things.

You can compare it with first a hopeful approach to capitalism.

What the chairman told Tom by Basil Banting (1900-85), 1965

We definitely saw the difference between work and employment, as we mentioned this in class, coming back in the poem.

you do not sweat, nobody pays for it

We aren’t sure whether Basil Banting wrote a poem about himself (autobiography). As we did some research on the internet about the poet’s life we found out that Basil wasn’t appreciated at all. He got a lot of comments of the art officers and his profession was considered to be unworthy.

As we read through the poem then, we see all these things coming back. Therefore we think that he is trying to show us how his life looked like with a great appreciation for the hard labour working class.

He was bemoaning his own lot, in the guise of a sympathetic/ ironic but detached observer. A clever way to avoid self-pity.

Go and find work: references to himself: he knew all to well the pressure of go and find work.

Grint: p.15: Radical approaches to work:

There was also an outright of the universal ‘myth’ of work as propagated by Lafargue in his ‘The right to be lazy’ (to the considerable chagrin of his father-in-law, Marx) (Kumar, 1984: 11) and put rather more delicately by Russel in his ‘In praise of Idleness’ where he claimed that ‘A great deal of harm is being done in the modern world by belief in virtuousness of WORK … the road to happiness and prosperity lies in an organized diminution of work…

In the poem this refers to what we call the happy and easy jobs (arts), where they charge you a lot of money versus the hard labour jobs, where you don’t have to pay a lot of money for (bus drivers, building constructors).

Which gives us a little view on Work and social class as well because the upper class saw his work as unworthy.

Writing style: there are a lot of rhetoric questions

...I really enjoyed reading and working on Poetry!!I Love Poetry and all the Literature!!Do you know Wordsworth? He defined poetry as "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings"...

Modern Times

2009-03-06T11:10:00.000-08:00

Set in the 1930s during the Great Depression era, the film's main concerns (and those of the oppressed Tramp) echo those of millions of people at the time - unemployment, poverty, and hunger. It has a number of wonderfully inventive and memorable routines and scenes that proclaim the frustrating struggle by proletarian man against the dehumanizing effects of the machine in the Industrial Age (at the time of Henry Ford's assembly line), and various social institutions.
(From the Website www.filmsite.org)

....

And now?In our Times? What's happening or What could happen?
Do you think that we are going in a NEW Great Depression era?
And What can you say about your future as Workers?Have any idea?
....

"No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off. "

(Tyler,Fight Club,1999)

Welcome!

2009-03-06T03:44:00.000-08:00

Hi guys...

WELCOME\MERHBA\BENVENUTI
TO MY BLOG

Finally I have my English blog too!
My name is Valeria,I'm 20 and this is My first experience abroad as a Student and not as a Tourist...
I hope that there will be a great communication and relationship with all you!

See you Wednesday\L-Erbgha

(i don't have the strange H in my computer :) ) !!!
Bye Byeee!