Case for Working with Your Hands, The

If you haven't read philosophy before, read it on a Kindle (integrated dictionary makes it very easy) and be prepared to read this book twice.Not for those who enjoy simple reading.

Very intelligent, but way way too intellectual for me. I luv working with my hands. I love motorbikes and a call to the simple life. But god, lets not build elaborate, dense and mind- bending theories around it.

The author obviously didn't enjoy his short-lived stints in office work but every office job is different and many people enjoy the intellectual challenge they offer. I enjoy working with my hands but I think I would find it very stressful if I had to make a living out of it, especially supporting a family.

This is my 5th copy of the book, as I give it to graduation presents to my younger friends and family members. Having come up through the blue collar ranks myself, I relate to this book. While the author uses a vocabulary that is advanced to say the least, and goes on and on in some of the paragraphs, his point never waivers. For anyone who has tackled a DIY project or built something from their own minds, this is what that is about. The ability to do for yourself, the ability to see actual work come to life; whether it's changing your oil, doing your own breaks, building a book shelf or play house for your children. From beginning to end the work and progress can be measured. This book is about rekindling that itch to just build it. Highly recommend.

Nice book with good hints, but too much fuss about fixing your own bike...A biker will love it, otherwise it's just a good book

Really well written, genuinely thought provoking. Matthew Crawford sets out the value and the beauty of craft work in an elegantly expressed and carefully constructed series of arguments. Through the unusual setting of motorbike maintenance, he subtly constructs and illustrates a case for working with our hands that is compelling in its appeals to both logic and morality and where his passion for what he does, both as mechanic and philosopher, draws the reader subtly but consciously onside. If you've ever had the satisfaction of making or repairing anything or raged at the frustration of being told to 'throw it away and get a new one', this book will strike many chords. But the analysis goes much further than individual work to offer an important critique of work generally and how the value of people and their efforts is continuously undermined in modern economies (good to see Braverman's ideas being re-expressed). All this ...and a superb destruction of management too.

I enjoyed reading Shop Class as Soul Craft and thought this was possibly the sequel to that book. However, The Case for Working with your Hands is the same book as Shop Class, but the European edition. Maybe I didn't read the discription carefully enough, though Amnazon lists this book to purchase along with the original American edition. Caveat Emptor!(4 Stars is for the actual book. I hate when people give 1 star beacause of this type of issue or it's not available in Kindle. Stars should be for the quality of the book itself).