Vocateurs

[naomikritzer]

One of my favorite ideas from the two books is the idea of vocateurs / vokers -- that in a post-scarcity economy where no one has to work more than 20 hours per week, there's a special word for the people who work anyway. It's made me ponder who I know who's a vocateur right now; of course, in our society, there are a lot of forms of work that aren't counted as work because they're not paid. (There are all sorts of people we'd call "hobbyists" who might be considered vocateurs in the Terra Ignota world.)

I like this idea enough that I really feel like "vocateur" should be a word in common usage. We have "workaholic," but that really has different connotations. "Workaholic" implies someone who is using work as a way of avoiding intimacy, or to escape their problems in their personal life. "Vocateur" is totally different -- it's someone who's working absurd hours because they are working on something that really excites them. (Or they're doing boring work, but in service of a vision that excites them.)