SHOP CLASS AS SOULCRAFT
Author MATTHEW B.CRAWFORD
Publisher THE PENGUIN PRESS
ISBN 978-1-59420-223-0
Some will love the emphasis and content of this book, others will hate and despise it. The fact is, the author is saying something the techno savvy, profit driven world needs to hear. Perhaps it would be better to say, that individuals driven mad by the sheer pace and also the idolatry of achievement leading to riches need to hear it and those in lower paid work and employers too need to consider and be encouraged. The author is both an intellectual and a hands on craftsman. He has come from both worlds. I am not wholly sure that he is thoroughly convincing in all that he says, he meanders around the point quite often. Sometimes you wonder exactly what he is saying. Nevertheless the overall presentation is helpful. These are the words of a theorist but also one who has made choices towards simplicity and what is now known as ‘blue collar’ work. He is both PHD and motorcycle mechanic and having chosen the latter as being the way of life more appropriate to true humanity. Yes, the world is becoming detached from hands on, we have live in the midst of it though. The book is not a Christian book but it contains truth that corresponds to the way God has created man. Paul the apostle was a man who was ‘hands on’ as a leather worker, making tents among other things but at the same time he was a man of letters. It was common for Jewish boys to be thus trained, both the mind and the skills of handling materials and making things both of usefulness and beauty. I am quite sure that there is something therapeutic in the wholeness that this book is an attempt to promote. What have we lost in the ceaseless pursuit of technological innovation? Yet, was not such pursuit part and parcel of what was intended for man. Obviously a book of this kind never goes far back enough, that is, into the spiritual and moral foundations of life, but it helps point the way to consider what it means to be truly human, made in the image of God.
