This is a handout that I created for a presentation that I gave on Underemployed Workers for my Culture and Work Class

1. EDU
728
Culture
and
Work
Presentation
Spring
2011
Kimberly
Renee
Knowles
Underemployed
Workers
in
America
Underutilized,
Unpaid,
and
Unhappy
“…politicians and the popular press have made a low unemployment rate the symbol of wellbeing for American
families. Largely ignored have been the economic and emotional problems of those who are underemployed in jobs
requiring significantly less education and work experience than they possess, often in positions offering much lower
wages, fewer benefits, fewer working hours, and less job security than in their last jobs (Feldman 1996:385).”
Primary
Concepts
to
Consider:
Re-­‐remembering,
Narrative,
Fiction/Artistic
Pursuits,
Vocational
Advice,
Mimesis,
Autopoeisis,
and
Imagination
Quotes
Re-­‐remembering
“To
embrace
the
future,
one
must
forget
the
past
in
a
gesture
of
inauguration,
beginning
and
rebeginning,
as
in
rituals
of
initiation.”
(Ricoeur
2004:504,
paraphrasing
Mark
Augé
in
Les
Formes
de
l’oubli)
“What
‘godly
diversion’
as
Kierkegaard
calls
forgetting
the
worry
to
distingish
it
from
ordinary
distractions,
would
be
capable
of
bringing
man
to
consider:
how
glorious
it
is
to
be
a
human
being?
…Carefree
memory
on
the
horizon
of
concerned
memory,
the
soul
common
to
memory
that
forgets
and
does
not
forget.”
(Ricoeur
2004:505,
quoting
Kierkegaard)
Narrative
“A
conversation
is
an
event
during
which
several
things
take
place:
we
evaluate
ourselves
and
others,
we
tell
and
retell
our
story,
we
see
the
past,
and
we
pose
possibilities
for
the
future.”
(Herda
1999:72)
“Stories
allow
us
to
mediate
the
past
and
the
future
to
the
present,
to
bring
into
one
plot
many
inconsistencies
in
our
lives.”
(Herda
1997:37)
Fiction/Artistic
Pursuits
“…the
more
we
learn
about
emplotment
in
fiction,
the
more
we
learn
to
plot
our
own
lives
(that
is
how
to
combine
and
configure
the
various
elements
of
our
temporality
and
identity).”
(Kearney
2004:171)
“…art
is,
‘an
open-­‐access
laboratory
of
imaginative
exploration.’”
(Kearney
quoted
in
Palmo
2010:142-­‐3)
“..by
its
mimetic
intention,
the
world
of
fiction
leads
us
to
the
heart
of
the
real
world
of
action.”
(Ricoeur
1981:296)
1

2. EDU
728
Culture
and
Work
Presentation
Spring
2011
Kimberly
Renee
Knowles
Vocational
Advice
“…if
you
are
attracted
to
the
most
difficult
books
out
of
an
urgent
need,
and
can
spare
four
years
to
devote
yourself
to
them,
go
to
college…but
if
this
is
not
the
case…the
good
news
is
you
don’t
have
to
go
through
the
motions
and
jump
through
the
hoops
for
the
sake
of
making
a
decent
living.”
(Crawford
2009:53)
“...[seek]
out
the
cracks
where
individual
agency
and
the
love
of
knowledge
can
be
realized
today,
in
one’s
own
life.”
(Crawford
2009:87)
Mimesis
“When
we
look
at
the
already
figured
world,
the
take-­‐for-­‐granted
world
in
mimesis1
we
connect
this
to
the
new
world
we
want
to
live
in,
mimesis3,
we
see
ourselves
in
different
capacities:
we
see
a
self
enlarged
by
the
appropriation
of
a
proposed
world
which
interpretation
unfolds.”
(Herda
1997a:62
quoted
in
Herda
1999:77)
“With
Mimesis2
opens
the
kingdom
of
the
as
if.”
(Ricoeur
1984:64)
Autopoeisis
“Both
organizations
and
people
as
living
systems
need
to
continuously
renew
and
reconfigure
themselves
through
a
process
whereby
the
integrity
of
each
remains
in
place…successful
leadership
will
encourage
this
process.”
(Herda
1997:35,
speaking
of
autopoeisis)
Imagination
“If
we
cannot
imagine
how
our
organizations
could
improve,
we
can
never
live
in
a
world
different
from
the
current
conditions.”
(Herda
1999:77)
“…the
mode
of
being
of
the
world
opened
up
by
the
text
is
a
mode
of
the
possible,
or
better
of
the
power-­‐to-­‐be:
therein
resides
the
subversive
power
of
the
imaginary.”
(Ricoeur
1981:93)
“Thinking
poetically,
acting
poetically,
dwelling
poetically
are
all
modalities
of
imagining
poetically.
They
are
ways
of
realizing
the
fundamental
possibilities
of
what
we
are.
For
as
Emily
Dickinson
wrote,
‘possibility
is
the
fuse
lit
by
the
spark
of
imagination.’”
(Kearney
2004:175)
2

3. EDU
728
Culture
and
Work
Presentation
Spring
2011
Kimberly
Renee
Knowles
Bibliography
Books/Articles/Dissertations
Crawford,
Matthew
2009
Shop
Class
as
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An
Inquiry
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the
Value
of
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The
Penguin
Press.
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Daniel
1996
The
Nature,
Antecedents,
and
Consequences
of
Underemployment.
Journal
of
Management
22:385-­‐407.
Herda,
Ellen
1997
Global
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Convergence
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7-­‐11.
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Dennis
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1984
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2004
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John
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ABC,
January
16.
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4. EDU
728
Culture
and
Work
Presentation
Spring
2011
Kimberly
Renee
Knowles
Vargas,
Elizabeth
2009
Down
But
Not
Out:
From
Hedge
Funds
to
Pizza
Delivery.
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20/20.
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March
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Images
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accessed
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2011.
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2010
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