Reading Comprehension Quiz

Matthew Crawford, “The Case for Working with Your Hands”

Read “The Case for Working with Your Hands” and check your comprehension by answering the following questions. Click the submit button when finished.

Question In his essay, Matthew Crawford writes that “such confrontations with material reality have become exotically unfamiliar.” What does he mean by “material reality”?

Question In Paragraph 2, Crawford writes that “work often feels more enervating than gliding.” What is the antonym of the word “enervating”?

Question Crawford’s primary argument in writing this article is

Question Crawford suggests that high schools have created environments that

Question Crawford details his life in the white-collar world of academia and then his work in a Washington, D.C. think tank. What does Crawford think of these types of jobs?

Question Crawford relates that his shop rate is $40 per hour where other garages go as high as $70 per hour. What purpose does this serve in the context of the arguments in this article?

Question Crawford relates the example of working on a motorcycle and using what he refers to as diagnostic logic. He writes that he often will ignore possibilities in order to preserve parts of the motorcycle that might be ruined through this process of examination. He then goes on to relate how the manual for these motorcycles tells mechanics to “be systematic in eliminating variables.” How does this anecdote relate to the world of white-collar work?

Question Comparing the middle manager to the mechanic, Crawford points out a key difference. What is that difference?