After Work, Helen Hester
After Work, Helen Hester
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After Work
A History of the Home and the Fight for Free Time

Author: Helen Hester, Nick Srnicek

Narrator: Marisa Calin

Unabridged: 6 hr 16 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 07/18/2023

Includes: Bonus Material Bonus Material Included

Synopsis

A vital and timely proposal for a feminist post-work politicsWould you let a robot clean your house?When we think about work, we still tend to think about workplaces—if we think about reducing work, we think about reducing working hours and spending more time at home. But the home has never been free from work, and with the continued gendered division of labor, women still do the bulk of domestic activities.As two-income families find themselves ever more time-poor, many look to outsource to cleaners, nannies, and care workers. More and more, it would seem, people are finding themselves without either the emotional or the financial resources to take care of themselves and each other. The home, rather than an escape from the work and its pressures, is in fact an extension of it.After Work is a crucial corrective to this trend, extending its attention beyond paid jobs to the impact of domestic work upon familial relationships, social bonds, and our very conceptions of domestic space. What if we automated housework?In this groundbreaking work, Helen Hester and Nick Srnicek argue that there is a crisis that can and should be tackled. Only by rethinking the way we organize our living arrangements, redefining our domestic standards, and remaining open to the automation of work done in the home, they argue, can we imagine a world that is truly post-work.

About Helen Hester

Helen Hester, head of film and media at the University of West London, is the author of several books and series editor for Ashgate’s Sexualities in Society book series. Nick Srnicek is a lecturer at City University, author of Platform Capitalism, coauthor of Inventing the Future, and coeditor of The Speculative Turn.

About Nick Srnicek

Nick Srnicek is a lecturer at City University, author of Platform Capitalism, co-author of Inventing the Future, and co-editor of The Speculative Turn: Continental Materialism and Realism.

About Marisa Calin

Marisa Calin is an actress, novelist, and multiple Earphones Award–winning narrator born in England and educated in New York at the American Academy of the Dramatic Arts. An artist with a flair for everything literary, she has written a young adult novel, You & Me, which received a starred review from Kirkus Reviews.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Owen

Admirable stuff, making arguments too often mired in posturing, shitposting and hand-waving in such a clear, concrete and calm way that by the end you would be the weirdo for *not* wanting communal child-rearing and constructivist bakeries.......more

Goodreads review by María

Me quedo con la reflexión sobre cómo la sociedad en todas sus etapas (desde la educación obligatoria hasta la salida al sistema) está pensada y preparada para que entreguemos gran parte de nuestra vida a trabajar para otras personas. Durante los 5 primeros capítulos ejemplifica este hecho con divers......more

Goodreads review by Malcolm

There’s a long tradition of post-work writing on the left, which I first encountered in Andre Gorz’s 1985 book Paths to Paradise. While I struggled with many of his assumptions, I appreciated the focus on labour process and questions of self-organisation on a collective basis. I especially found the......more

Goodreads review by Kyrill

Nimble, erudite, and at times invigorating. Anthropology of something so familiar and homely, we’ve just all taken it as how things are. The authors cover a huge range of material on the topics of housework, family, and the social and material structures that sustain them, but the writing remains en......more

Goodreads review by Milo

4 stars. In ‘After Work’, Helen Hester and Nick Srnicek delve into an incredibly in-depth analysis, spread across four key areas: the evolution of household technologies, the shifting norms, standards, and expectations of domestic labour and social reproduction, the evolving concepts and anticipatio......more

Quotes

“A meticulously researched and agilely argued plea for the reduction of domestic labor.” Washington Post

“After Work takes an important look at the implications for the domestic sphere if work is reduced.” Financial Times (London)

“Will get people talking about their interminable to-do lists. Anyone under thirty who wants to know what their life is going to look like should read it.” Sunday Times (London)

“Anyone seeking cozy thoughts about the joys of spring cleaning should look elsewhere…Clear and concise, with a lot of learning worn lightly.” The Guardian (London)

“An earnest appeal to rethink why people work and how they spend their time.” Publishers Weekly

“Why do breakthroughs of technology so rarely lift the burden of drudgery?…After Work tackles this problem and provides a new vision of a future that moves us past toil.” Jules Gleeson, co-editor of Transgender Marxism

“We are taught to think that there’s no alternative to the sad model of social reproduction centered on the single-family home and privatized family. Here is a practical and creative guide to how we might begin to move beyond that paradigm." Kathi Weeks, author of The Problem with Work

“American narrator Marisa Calin’s accent was influenced by growing up in England. In a British-sounding voice she moves through the basics, slowing down to deliver more emotional words with intimacy.” AudioFile

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