Introduction
Ben Hampers book Rivethead, Tales From The Assembly
Line can be described as gritty in the face account of a manufacturing plant workers
struggles against his factory, his co-workers, and the time
time clock. Hamper makes no apologies for any of his activities
many of that have been unorthodox or illegal. Instead he
justifies them in a approach that makes the factory workers
conflict, disturbance, fighting, turmoil apparent to prospects who have under no circumstances set feet on an
manufacturing plant and wouldnt have the vaguest idea just how much
blood, perspiration and holes go into the items we take pertaining to
granted each day.
Rivethead is an account with the entire life of Author
Bill Hamper, by his long family family tree of shoprats and
his catholic college upbringing to his many different
positions on the Basic Motors flow line and his
evenly numerous lay-offs from the GENERAL MOTORS Truck Bus Division.
Sadly the many years of back disregarding labor mixed
with Hinders own personal devils led him to check in an
outpatient mental center (at the time of the completion of
this book) where he discovers daily to handle his several years
of mental anguish.
Rivethead is a cultural commentary on industrial America
assembly line job, and the vehicle industry. This essay
nevertheless , will concentrate on the more particular aspects
Hinder considers, including the monotony needed on a (then)
modern flow line, the relationship and hierarchy between
workers and the interaction with management along with
both group and specific responses to work and job
pleasure (or shortage there of).
Analysis
When Henry Ford first produced the idea of the
assembly line he was heralded as one of the most frontward
thinking men of his time, and without the assembly series we
would no doubt certainly not be while powerful a nation as we are today.
The assembly line theory as it matured in commercial
society yet , proved to destroy personnel creativity and
stifle the actual essence of human your life. Growth and change.
On an manufacturing plant workers happen to be degraded to automatons
executing the same tasks over and over and also.
Day in working day
out, without having any kind of knowledge or input into any of
the other duties related to completion of the job. This
boredom in the workplace leaks over into the daily life of
many factory workers and affects that they live their particular life
outside of the factory following the whistle blows as much as this
does when theyre around the assembly line. This spillover was
observed by simply Hamper of his Grand daddy. Straight residence from
operate, dinner, overnight time news and immediately into bed by
7: 00 p. meters. He came about each weekday at a few: 30 a.
m., fixed himself
a lot of black caffeine, turned on the kitchen radio, smoked cigarettes a
several Lucky Attacks and patiently lay to keep for work on a
1 / 4 to five. This strategy never different one iota in the
four he worked for GM (Hamper pg. 6). It is fairly
obvious that the monotony of the assembly line has a way of
placing personal sessions for its employees that at some point
work all their way out from the factory and into the home. One
interesting question that may be raised, is whether people who
just like their lifestyle to be routinized eventually find their method
to an manufacturing plant or in the event the assembly line monotony brings
the particular capabilities to routinize out in people who previously would
not live by many sessions.
The human relationships Hamper talks about between the personnel
on the assembly line are exceptional to say the least and
sometimes humorous or hazardous. After scanning this book My spouse and i
would surmise that most manufacturing plant workers build friendships
with other factory personnel almost specifically. This could be
due to their similarity of interests, likeness of careers
the fact that they will be in contact daily, or just simply by virtue
in the timing with their shifts (as was Hampers case). I believe
one thing that helped to bind the employees together was your
fact that that they saw this as personnel against supervision and by
their solidarity that they could turn the balance of power in
their prefer. This solidarity was noticeable when a fresh
supervisor was hired who wasnt slicing the workers any kind of
slack, hence the workers resorted to skade. We merely had
zero other recourse.
At times these power-gods had to be
reminded that it was we, the workers, who also kept this place
runnin (Hamper pg. 206). Interactions between employees were
generally very very good, although there was obviously a hierarchy among
the workers between your new guys and the knowledgeable guys.
Franklin
made a job out of intimidating rookies
(Hamper pg. 51) since until a worker got put in 90 days he
could possibly be fired for virtually any reason. Only a few of Hampers
co-workers observed eye to.
