Vocation is more than a job. It is our relationships and responsibilities woven into the work of God. In following our calling to seek the welfare of our world, we find that it flourishes and so do we. Garber offers here a book for parents, artists, students, public servants and businesspeople—for all who want to discover the virtue of vocation.

Vocational occupations are attractive not so much for their material rewards as for the prestige and self-fulfillment they confer. They require a strong personal commitment, which can be subjectively experienced in terms of passion and selflessness. The choice of a career in the cultural sector provides a good example of this. What are the terms of this calling? What predisposes individuals to answer it? What are the meanings of such a choice? To answer these questions, this book focuses on would-be cultural managers. By identifying their social patterns, by revealing the resources, expectations and visions of the world they invest in their choice, it sheds new light on these occupations. In these intermediary and indeterminate social positions, family heritages intersect with educational strategies, aspirations of upward mobility with tactics against downward mobility, and social critique with adjustment strategies. Ultimately the study of career choices in cultural management suggests a new take on the analysis of social reproduction and on the embodiment of the new spirit of capitalism. The empirical findings of this research conducted in France are set in a broader comparative perspective, at the European level and with the USA.

Excerpt from Choosing a Vocation The manuscript of this book was practically ready for publication when Professor Parsons died. For a year prior to his death he had given a large part of his time to Vocation Bureau work. Some of the material here used appeared in articles in The Arena, and a number of the "cases" in Part III have been published in the daily papers of Boston and New York. The appearance of these articles brought hundreds of letters of inquiry from all parts of the United States, expressing interest in the effort to give scientific vocational counsel to the young. That Professor Parsons would have carried the plan to a greater completeness had he lived, there is no doubt; but the work that he did do is of such value that it is believed many will be grateful to get such information about it as can be given in this volume. Whatever doubts there may be of the practicability of giving expert vocational counsel to young men and women, there are certain simple truths upon which the plan is based, and which I believe no one will deny. 1. It is better to choose a vocation than merely to "hunt a job." 2. No one should choose a vocation without careful self-analysis, thorough, honest, and under guidance. 3. The youth should have a large survey of the field of vocations, and not simply drop into the convenient or accidental position. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.