1, One of the readings that was significant to me was “Estranged Labor” from Karl Marx. This reading discusses how under capitalism, society is divided into the wage workers and the capitalists who have misappropriated the means of production from the workers, thereby making them suffer alienation in many different forms. The first form of alienation is where the worker grows to see the object of his work as foreign and hostile to himself. Although the worker invests his entire life into this object, he doesn’t own the means of production and gains nothing out of his work other than a mere paycheck that’s just enough for him to survive and continue working. The more he produces the more alienated he becomes. This alienation is where the worker is estranged from the product. The second alienation is where the worker is alienated from the actual activity of working. This is because this work doesn’t come from his natural desire to express himself creatively but instead he is only working as a means of survival. He is forced to work, not for himself, but for someone else benefit. Which means that typically the working is doing a job that is demeaning to him, or he finds to be lesser than himself, because he’s forced to do this work he loses his sense of self and dignity in the process. The third kind is alienation from his species …show more content…
Unlike someone who is from the developing world who may have never had access to electricity, let alone a computer in their entire life. Their knowledge is obsolete, and because they can't keep up in this "digital age" they'll most likely be forced to work in manual labor to make ends