Work Hard and You Shall Be Rewarded : Urban Folklore from the Paperwork Empire

Author Series Editor Alan Dundes
Wayne State University Press
 9780814324325
0-8143-2432-0

Anyone who has ever filled in a form in triplicate, taken an aptitude test, or been rebuffed by a form letter will appreciate the urban folklore found in this collection. Urban people as a folk are bound.

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together by their unhappy experiences in battling "the system," whether that system is the machinery of government or the office where one works. The wonderfully expressive materials in this book--chain letters, memoranda, notices, and cartoons--touch upon every major controversy of urban America: racism, sex, politics, automation, alienation, welfare, the women's movement, military mentality, and office bureaucracy. The humor of the materials pinpoints the ills and frustrations of modern society and becomes, in turn, an escape from them.