Frágiles
Frágiles

Fragile. Letters on anxiety and hope in the new culture

Frágiles

A portrait of the new anxious culture of immaterial work, and an attempt to find a way out.

This book is motivated by an anonymous voice: that of a woman who, after reading the author’s previous essay El entusiasmo, reached out to her to say that she had described a work life so similar to hers that reading the book had made her see it as conflictive and less sustainable.

Frágiles takes on the ambivalences and derivations of an anxious culture where immaterial and creative work has turned into a practice of undefined practices that transcend that idea of work as a central activity that looked to discipline us and describe us socially. In its place, it overwhelms us with tasks mediated by technology and woven through with acceptance and numbers, so that work isn’t always what it seems and anxiety, contingency, and insecurity are normalized as the new emotional languages of workers.

In the conversation that gave way to this letter, the anonymous voice asked insistently: “Where is the hope?” This essay, then, is the possible answer that Zafra began to think about.

PAGES288
SERIESArgumentos
PUBLICATION28/04/2021
SHARE ON
 
Remedios Zafra

Remedios Zafra

Remedios Zafra (Zuheros, Córdoba, 1973) es escritora, profesora universitaria e investigadora del Instituto de Filosofía del Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas. Ha sido profesora de Antropología, Políticas de la Mirada y Estudios de Género. Sus trabajos se orientan al estudio crítico de la cultura contemporánea, la creación e internet. Es autora de El bucle invisible, Frágiles, El entusiasmo. Precariedad y trabajo creativo en la era digital (Premio Anagrama de Ensayo y Premio Estado Crítico), Ojos y capital, (h)adas, Un cuarto propio conectado y Netianas, entre otros. Su obra ha obtenido el Premio Internacional de ensayo Jovellanos; Meridiana de Cultura; de las Letras El Público; Málaga de Ensayo; de Investigación de la Cátedra Leonor de Guzmán y de Ensayo Carmen de Burgos.