Karl Marx's Estranged Labor

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from his true nature once he becomes a laborer.
This process is thoroughly explained throughout Estranged Labor. This study will
reveal this process and argue it's validity. Appendant to this study on
alienation there will be a micro-study which will attempt to ascertain Marx's
view of freedom (i.e. positive or negative). The study on alienation in
conjunction with the micro-study on Marx's view of freedom will help not only
reveal why Marx feels labor limits mans freedom, but it will also identify
exactly what kind of freedom is being limited.
Karl Marx identifies estranged labor as labor alien to man. Marx
explains the condition of estranged labor as the result of man participating in
an institution alien to his nature. It is my interpretation that man is
alienated from his labor because he is not the reaper of what he sows. Because
he is never the recipient of his efforts the laborer lacks identity with what he
creates. For Marx then labor is "alien to the ...

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result of
this realization the objectification of labor occurs. For the worker the labor
becomes an object, something shapeless and unidentifiable. Because labor is
objectified, the laborer begins to identify the product of labor as labor. In
other words all the worker can identify as a product of his labor, given the
condition of what he produces as a shapeless, unidentifiable object, is labor.
The worker is then left with only labor as the end product of his efforts. The
emerging condition is that he works to create more work. For Marx the monotonous
redundancy of this condition is highly detrimental because the worker loses
himself in his efforts. He argues that this situation is ...

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