Work is no longer a secure base, but rather a source of anxiety and indignity, both a matter of life and death and utterly meaningless, overwhelming and yet so insubstantial it could run through our fingers. It is normal to feel under threat and undervalued, to feel snivellingly grateful to have a job, any job. We must be sure not to take work for granted and yet be willing to be taken for granted ourselves.

-Ivor Southwood on knowledge work and temping

Excerpted from The New Inquiry Magazine, No. 1: Precarity

artwork by Imp Kerr