With an eye on the incarnated knowledge on associated work and self-management

Abstract

We consider that, when focusing the multiple dimensions of the diverse world of work, the field of studies and research about Work and Education contribute to turn more transparent the unit of the Real. In that horizon, we bring to the surface situations in that, pressed by the unemployment threat, the workers – as collective and singular subjects – look for to reassure, in an associated and self-management ways, forms to be in the world. We problematize the knowledge of associated work, indicating the need to identify with larger precision the attributes of such work. Taking into account that, historically, those work experiences are configurated in certain social relations of production, we indicate some theoretical contributions of Ergology particularly regarding its understanding that human activity is permeated by a “dramatic of use of the self”. To conclude, we demand an “incarnated reflexive movement” on the knowledge about the associated work, woven in the live work activity, in the workers' forums, as well as in the political and theoretical-conceptual debates. (The incarnate carries a double sense: of “meat” and of color “red”).

Key words: work and education, associated work knowledge, production and legitimization of knowledge.