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BUSINESS ENGLISH · BUSINESS ISSUES · ADVANCED (C1-C2)

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ANTI- WORK

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1Warm up

In pairs, discuss the following questions.

1. Why do you work? What does work give you which is valuable (if anything)?

2. Ifyoudidnothavetowork, whatwouldyoudowithyourtime? Doyouthinkyouwouldbehappy?

Why/why not?

3. What problems do you have/have you had in your working life which you would like to change?

What would you do to change them?

4. Do you think it is possible for a society to exist where everyone worked a lot less than they do

now and were able to enjoy more leisure time? Why/why not?

2Listening for details

Listen to the interview with a supporter of the antiwork movement and tick which questions are asked.

Why don"t you want to work?Were you hurt?

What"s the point of it all?When did your attitude change?

Why did you go there?What did you do about it?

Have you always been antiwork?Are you happier now?

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3Listening comprehension

Listen again and decide if the following information is Given (G) or Not Given (NG).

1. the job that Pierre"s father did for a living ...

2. the job that Pierre did when he was young ...

3. the length of time Pierre has spent working as a welder ...

4. the yearly increase in pay that Pierre used to get ...

5. the amount of bonus that senior management used to get at Pierre"s former company ...

6. whether Pierre makes more or less money now than he did before

7. what Pierre"s previous professional goal was ...

8. the person whose approval he seeks now ...

Now in pairs, discuss the following questions.

1. Pierre said his family has a "strong work ethic". What does that mean?

2. Doyouthinkyoushouldstaylateinyourjobwheneveryouhavetoandworkweekendsifneeded?

Why/why not?

3. Doyouthinkseniormanagementshouldgethigherbonusesthantherestoftheworkers? Why/why

not?

4. Do you work to get the "status and respect of other people"? If not, why do you work?

4Focus on vocabulary

Part A: Match the following vocabulary to the definitions. 1. idleness (n) a. the state of being extremely tired and unable to concentrate due to working too much

2. pri

vation (n) b. the regular people in society or an organisation, not the authorities

3. blue-

collar (adj.) c. be connected in some way and difficult to separate

4. grass

roots (n) d. a state of being without the basic requirements needed to live

5. stark (adj.) e. total or complete

6. capitalism (n) f. an economic system where business and industry is run by private owners for profit, not by the government

7. inter

twine (v) g. an unproductive state 8. burnout (n) h. being the part of the workforce who does manual labour

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PartB:NowputthevocabularyfromPartAintothecorrectgapsinthefollowingsentences. Youmay need to change the form of the word.

1. My relationship with her father has been a source of pain for me for a while, whereas she is a

source of huge joy. Happiness and pain are so often in life.

2. He claims to be researching his next book on his computer, but I never see anything other than

computer games. He seems to live in a state of complete

3. In a

change of direction that brought a lot of criticism from the public, the government has just announced its plans to increase the tax rate.

4. I was the first to be able to go to university in my family, but I"m proud of my

roots.

5. She abruptly quit her job and went travelling. Her family say she is suffering from

but I think she"s met someone who she went to see.

6. With America"s jails making record profits from the largest prison population in the world, many

are asking if has gone too far.

7. As a politician, he"s not popular with those in power, but he"s extremely popular at a

level which is far more important.

8. Asachild, shegrewupinastateof

asdroughtandfamineragedacrossthecountry. It was only as an adult that she started to be able to afford the finer things in life.

Now in pairs, discuss the following questions.

1. Have you or anyone you know ever suffered fromburnout? What do you think causes it? What

do you think you need to do about it?

2. Does the government in your country havegrassrootssupport do you think? Why/why not?

3. Does your country operate on a system ofcapitalism? What do you think are the positives and

negatives of a country that uses this system?

5Skimming for gist

Quickly read through the article on page four and decide which of the following titles can be used for

each paragraph.

1. What does the antiwork movement stand for?

2. What can replace work?

3. How the movement grew.

4. The future of our relationship with work.

5. 20th Century philosophy foundations.

6. How companies will attract workers in the future.

7. How coronavirus affected work.

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What"s the point?

The rise of the antiwork movement

A."Unemployment for all, not just the rich!" is the slogan of the growing movement. Founded in 2013 on the socialmedia site, Reddit, r/antiwork started as a forum to discuss concepts and ideas questioning the validity of humanlabour. These are not new. In 1935, the British philosopher and mathematician, Bertrand Russell, published InPraise of Idleness and Other Essays. In it, he argued that if work were to be shared more equally among humanbeings, it would result in fewer hours spent working for all of us, unemployment would vanish and our free timewould increase. The effect of this would be a rise in the general happiness of the population and an increase inthe number of people producing science and art. What we have instead are large numbers of people living withhunger and privation while many others work long hours at the cost of their health and wellbeing. He pointed outthat our modern-day methods of production give us the opportunity to live a life of ease, yet we have somehowmanaged to create a world where many of us are working longer hours than before mechanisation. This makes usfoolish.

B.Russell"s work is a bible of the *subreddit, which in 2019, prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, had around 13,000subscribers. As the effects of the virus spread around the world and affected jobs, both in terms of people losingthem and people being forced to work in potentially dangerous conditions, the popularity of the forum increased.In early 2020, the number of people on the subreddit went up to 100,000. With the increase in the number ofpeople leaving their jobs, the group attracted media attention as users began posting screenshots of their texts totheir bosses saying they no longer wished to work at their place of employment. By November 2021, there wereover 1 million members. The following month, it hit over 1.4 million and in January 2022, it was at 1.7 million.

C.The pandemic brutally highlighted the inequalities across the working world. Many workers, particularly thosein blue-collar jobs, found themselves forced to work in conditions which did not have adequate safety measuresagainst being infected. If they did catch the coronavirus, they didn"t have enough paid sick days to be able torecover properly. The closure of schools further increased pressure on parents to supervise their children athome, forcing some parents to take leave or those who were working at home to simultaneously juggle workand childcare. As the isolated months marched on, burnout and mental health issues increased, leading to manyquestioning the values of our society. The massive increase in wealth for billionaires such as Jeff Bezos, MarkZuckerberg and Elon Musk during the same period only added to the sense for many that something in our societyis deeply defective.

D.Like many grassroots movements, the antiwork subreddit doesn"t necessarily have a clear manifesto. It"s acollection of people with different views and ideas brought together having identified a common problem. It"sultimately there to begin a conversation. Its members aren"t against the concept of work itself, but rather howwork is structured in a capitalist system. Some wish to improve conditions for workers and organise for labourrights, others to work for themselves. It has led to discussions about the value of work when there are a hostof positions that add little to no value to society, although are often well-paid. This is in stark contrast to jobssuch as nurses, care home assistants and teachers who are frequently paid poorly, almost as a penalty for thefact that doing these important jobs cannot be financially motivated. A Redditor recently wrote that his teenageson had just got a job delivering pizza where, including tips, he made in the region of $18-19 per hour. On theother hand, his wife, a teacher with a Master"s degree, made $16 per hour. For many on the forum, this wasyet another sign that Capitalism doesn"t value education unless money can be made from it. However, we allundeniably benefit from a well-educated population. Therefore, they argue, Capitalism"s interests and society"s,may not be intertwined.

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E.Nobody is under any illusion that things will change overnight. However, the movement has certainly startedconversations, evenamongthosewhoareinoppositiontoit. Businesseshopingtomakeaprofitbyaskingworkersto work long hours in poor conditions for low pay are having to rethink. Many have already shut down. The issuehas often been that we see ourselves and our work as one and the same. We let our work define us. Factoryworkers in the UK during the 1800s also worked in terrible conditions for long hours, but didn"t suffer the samedepression issues and burnout as we do. Why? Because their work was just what they did when they weren"t withtheir friends and families. Nowadays, we separate ourselves from our loved ones to work with an unprecedentedamount of pressure and isolation. The antiwork movement seeks to change that. The echoes of these ideas couldstill be felt generations from now.Sources: The Guardian, BBC, Newsweek, Reddit

6Reading comprehension

Read the following statements and decide if they are True (T), False (F) or Not Given (NG).

1. The concept of antiwork has been around for less than ten years.

2. Russell pointed out the ridiculousness of people working longer hours despite us having machines

to do much of the work for us.

3. Most of the people on the r/antiwork subreddit are Christian.

4. In December 2021, an additional 400,000 subscribers joined the forum.

5. According to the article, a lot of people in service jobs weren"t allowed to work due to the dangers

of the situation.

6. The antiwork movement has distinct demands which it is working towards to change the way we

work.

7. The antiwork movement believes that people working in the financial sector add little value to

society.

8. According to the article, employees in the 1800s had fewer issues with mental health compared

to the modern day as they had a different attitude towards their work.

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7Synonyms (optional)

Read the article on page four again and find synonyms for the following words. 1. disappear (para. A) 2. emphasised (para. A) 3. reached (para. B) 4. satisfactory (para. C) 5. broken (para. C) 6. punishment (para. D) 7. indisputably (para. D)

8Talking point

In pairs discuss the following questions.

1. What is your reaction to the antiwork movement? Is it something you might support, or do you

disapprove? Why?

2. Do you agree with Russell"s idea that if work was distributed more equally, then everyone might

have more free time and there would be less unemployment? Do you think this idea is practical?

Why/Why not?

3. How would you address the issues of some people working far too much, while others aren"t able

to find work and suffer as a result?

4. Do you think that the antiwork movement will change the way society is organised over time? Or

not? Why?

9Extra activity/homework

Read the following essay title.

The only real purpose of life is to work. Without work, we have no structure and no meaning to our lives. Without work, there would be no leisure and no pleasure. Life would be meaningless. To what extent do you agree with the above statement?

You should:

• Write at least 250 words.

• Check your spelling, grammar and punctuation.

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Transcripts

2.Listening for details

Interviewer:... And with us here in the studio today is Pierre to discuss the Antiwork movement.Pierre - thanks for joining us!

Pierre:Thanks for having me!

Interviewer:Have you always been antiwork?

Pierre:Not at all. To tell you the truth, I heard about the movement some time ago and Ithought it was just a bunch of people who were lazy. My family has a strong workethic. We were brought up to believe that working hard was what you needed to doto be successful. My dad worked around sixty to seventy hours a week when I wasgrowing up. My mum worked two jobs: as a receptionist and a fitness instructor, afterwe"d all gone to school. We all got jobs to earn extra money as soon as we were oldenough. I waited tables, my little brother did a paper round. We were all busy, ALL the

time.

Interviewer:So when did your attitude change?

Pierre:I spent six years working as a welder. I worked hard at my job. Really hard. I"m trainedin all the departments so I can train others as well as do the job. I stayed late wheneverI was asked to. Fridays, Saturdays, it didn"t matter. I was always first in and last to leave.But after a while, I noticed that I was getting the same 0.5% pay rise as everyone else.Meanwhile, there"s such a huge turnover in management that no one who I report toknows me or remembers any of the hard work I"ve put in all these years. So, I startedto ask myself, what"s the point of it all? I"m not getting promoted, I"m not getting thebonuses that senior management are seeing.

Interviewer:So, what did you do about it?

Pierre:Oh, I still work hard. Antiwork isn"t about not working at all. Most of the people in themovement work. It"s about deciding how you want to spend your energy and who youwant to work for. I decided I wanted to work for myself. I learned so many skills on thejob, plus I"ve always loved my motorbike. I"m a gearhead (laughs). So, I started workingfor myself, I restore people"s old cars and motorcycles. I took a hit in terms of pay, butI"m so much happier now. I"m starting to do custom work which pays more and there"sa bit of an art to it. It"s so good to look at a car I"ve fixed up, or soup up the engine ofa bike. There"s 100% more satisfaction to that than busting a gut to make money for acompany that doesn"t give a damn about you.

Interviewer:And are you happier now?

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Pierre:Much more so. I had to shift my focus and my belief system and that took a little while.I always thought I"d end up running my own department in a company. I wanted statusand the respect of other people - and my need for that was what my happiness wasbuilt on. Now I"m the CEO of my own company, but I"m also the tea boy (laughs). I"verealised that my feeling of self-fulfilment was more about how I spent my time thanwhat people thought about the time that I spent. These days, if I think I"ve done a goodday"s work, that"s all that matters. That"s the only approval that I need. My life has toomuch value to spend it working for someone who just sees me as a number.

Interviewer:Thanks for coming in, Pierre. Much food for thought there. I see our lines are busyalready, let"s see who we"ve got on Line 1 ...

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Key

1.Warm up

5 mins.

This gives students the opportunity to discuss their basic attitudes to work ahead of the listening and reading

exercises. You may want to elicit the meaning of the antiwork movement and see if any of them know anything

about it.

2.Listening for details

5 mins.

This allows students to hear the recording and listen to the structure of the conversation ahead of doing the

comprehension. Very advanced students may be able to manage both tasks in one listening. ?What"s the point of it all??When did your attitude change? ?What did you do about it??Have you always been antiwork? ?Are you happier now?

3.Listening comprehension

10 mins.

Ask students to listen again and identify the specific information that they are given in the interview. When they

have finished, ask them to discuss the questions and circulate and help as needed. Note: You may want to give them the following vocabulary or elicit it.

gearhead- someone who is a car and/or motorbike fanatic, usually with a talent for fixing them or taking them

apart and improving them. soup up- to improve an engine so that it runs better and faster bust a gut- to try very hard

1. Not Given

2. Given. "I waited tables ..." (a waiter)

3. Given. Six years.

4. Given. 0.5%

5. Not Given

6. Given. "I took a hit in terms of pay ..."

7. Given. "I always thought I"d end up running my own department in a company."

8. Given. "These days, if I think I"ve done a good day"s work, that"s all that matters. That"s the only approval that

I need."

4.Focus on vocabulary

Part A

5 mins.

Ensure students can correctly pronounce the target vocabulary. Ask them to complete the task unaided in the

first instance, but then allow them to use a reference if needed.

1. → g. 2. → d. 3. → h. 4. → b. 5. → e. 6. → f. 7. → c. 8. → a.

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Part B

10 mins.

Ask students to identify which parts of speech could fill the gaps before completing the exercise. When they

have finished, ask them to discuss the questions in order to practise using the vocabulary. Circulate and help as

needed.

1. intertwined 2. idleness 3. stark 4. blue-collar

5. burnout 6. capitalism 7. grassroots 8. privation

5.Skimming for gist

5 mins.

You may want to set a time limit to encourage students to skim read rather than read in detail.

Note: A subreddit is a special section of Reddit focused on particular interests. There are thousands of them on

Reddit catering to thousands of special areas of interest.

1. paragraph D

2. not used

3. paragraph B

4. paragraph E

5. paragraph A

6. not used

7. paragraph C

Sources:

https://www.theguardian.com https://www.reddit.com/r/antiwork/

6.Reading comprehension

10 mins.

Ask students to read in more detail and complete the exercise. Ask them to underline where they find the answer.

If they are unable to do this, then it will be Not Given.

1. False. "r/antiworkstarted as a forum to discuss concepts and ideas questioning the validity of human labour.

These are not new."

2. True. "He pointed out that our modern-day methods of production give us the opportunity to live a life of

ease, yet we have somehow managed to create a world where many of us are working longer hours than before

mechanisation. This makes us foolish."

3. Not Given.

4. True. " By November 2021, there were over 1 million members. The following month, it hit over 1.4 million ..."

5. False. "Many workers, particularly those in blue-collar jobs, found themselves forced to work in conditions

which did not have adequate safety measures against being infected."

6. False. "... the antiwork subreddit doesn"t necessarily have a clear manifesto."

7. Not Given.

8. True. "Factory workers in the UK during the 1800s also worked in terrible conditions for long hours, but didn"t

suffer the same depression issues and burnout as we do ... their work was just what they did when they weren"t

with their friends and families."

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7.Synonyms (optional)

5 mins.

For extra vocabulary support, ask students to quickly scan the text looking for the following synonyms. You could

do this prior to reading or after.

1. vanish2. pointed out

3. hit4. adequate

5. defective6. penalty

7. undeniably

8.Talking point

10 mins.

Ask students to discuss the questions in pairs or small groups. Circulate and help as needed.

9.Extra activity/homework

45 mins+.

Ask the students to plan, write, and edit their essays using the ideas and material covered in the lesson. You may

want them to write it in exam conditions, or you may want them to do their own research in addition to what

you have covered in the lesson and write it with reference to their sources. Ensure you give students feedback on

their work.

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