Erik Baker
@erikmbaker.bsky.social
Historian at Harvard, senior editor at The Drift, author of Make Your Own Job
erikmbaker.com
erikmbaker.com
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Erik Baker
@erikmbaker.bsky.social
· Jan 14
Today's the day! I poured everything I've got into this book, and now, eight years after I started working on it, it is officially published! I'm so grateful for everyone who helped make this book a reality - and to all of my readers for their support.
Reposted by Erik Baker
“The memory of my own voice would come back to me, the way I’d hurled it around: my father, my father, my father.”
Read Mimi Diamond’s Issue Sixteen story, online today:
www.thedriftmag.com/good-health/
Read Mimi Diamond’s Issue Sixteen story, online today:
www.thedriftmag.com/good-health/
Good Health
Fiction
www.thedriftmag.com
November 7, 2025 at 4:36 PM
“The memory of my own voice would come back to me, the way I’d hurled it around: my father, my father, my father.”
Read Mimi Diamond’s Issue Sixteen story, online today:
www.thedriftmag.com/good-health/
Read Mimi Diamond’s Issue Sixteen story, online today:
www.thedriftmag.com/good-health/
Reposted by Erik Baker
Reposted by Erik Baker
Join us, @ndbooks.bsky.social, Krithika Varagur, Zain Khalid, Sloane Crosley, and Rob Franklin, on November 18 to celebrate the publication of the newest installment of Solvej Balle’s series “On the Calculation of Volume.”
www.mcnallyjackson.com/event/calcul...
www.mcnallyjackson.com/event/calcul...
November 6, 2025 at 5:00 PM
Join us, @ndbooks.bsky.social, Krithika Varagur, Zain Khalid, Sloane Crosley, and Rob Franklin, on November 18 to celebrate the publication of the newest installment of Solvej Balle’s series “On the Calculation of Volume.”
www.mcnallyjackson.com/event/calcul...
www.mcnallyjackson.com/event/calcul...
Reposted by Erik Baker
Listeners of @ifbookspod.bsky.social will enjoy this essay. I haven't read many self-help books but thanks to the show I'm pretty familiar with a lot of the titles referenced.
I have an essay on self-help, the "philosophy" industry, and human finitude in our new issue. As Dylan said of "Tangled Up In Blue," it took me ten years to live and two to write. I hope you enjoy. www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
November 3, 2025 at 10:38 PM
Listeners of @ifbookspod.bsky.social will enjoy this essay. I haven't read many self-help books but thanks to the show I'm pretty familiar with a lot of the titles referenced.
Reposted by Erik Baker
Any reality made by human beings can be remade by them. (...) The things we can accomplish together are, by definition, within our sphere of control, even if we have to act through structures that are bigger than any of us alone to achieve them.
By @erikmbaker
By @erikmbaker
“To imagine yourself as a modern-day Seneca, a sage liberated from the cares afflicting more ordinary souls, is its own form of self-indulgence,” @erikmbaker.bsky.social argues in his Issue Sixteen essay on self-help philosophy.
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Shitty Life
Self-Help Gets Philosophical
www.thedriftmag.com
November 1, 2025 at 5:17 PM
Any reality made by human beings can be remade by them. (...) The things we can accomplish together are, by definition, within our sphere of control, even if we have to act through structures that are bigger than any of us alone to achieve them.
By @erikmbaker
By @erikmbaker
Reposted by Erik Baker
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Shitty Life
Self-Help Gets Philosophical
www.thedriftmag.com
November 2, 2025 at 5:02 PM
Reposted by Erik Baker
NYT couldn't find someone to defend the Gates memo who wasn't a former *Gates scholar*??
Opinion | Bill Gates Has a Point
www.nytimes.com
November 3, 2025 at 4:19 PM
NYT couldn't find someone to defend the Gates memo who wasn't a former *Gates scholar*??
Reposted by Erik Baker
This entire essay is timely, perceptive and useful, so of course I'm sharing the one part that made me chortle
November 2, 2025 at 7:51 PM
This entire essay is timely, perceptive and useful, so of course I'm sharing the one part that made me chortle
Reposted by Erik Baker
ICYMI, my latest essay in @thedriftmag.com, which also serves as a postscript of sorts to Make Your Own Job www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Shitty Life
Self-Help Gets Philosophical
www.thedriftmag.com
November 1, 2025 at 5:32 PM
ICYMI, my latest essay in @thedriftmag.com, which also serves as a postscript of sorts to Make Your Own Job www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
Reposted by Erik Baker
thought this was an interesting read. admittedly I’m super out of the loop on self-help books but I’m not entirely surprised that stoicism has cut a swathe across the entire industry.
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Shitty Life
Self-Help Gets Philosophical
www.thedriftmag.com
November 1, 2025 at 8:49 PM
thought this was an interesting read. admittedly I’m super out of the loop on self-help books but I’m not entirely surprised that stoicism has cut a swathe across the entire industry.
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
Reposted by Erik Baker
Abduction of Proserpina, by Giambologna, 1579 (from the @NortonSimon Museum in Pasadena), 📸 by @nturchiarophoto
November 2, 2025 at 3:13 PM
Abduction of Proserpina, by Giambologna, 1579 (from the @NortonSimon Museum in Pasadena), 📸 by @nturchiarophoto
Reposted by Erik Baker
Trump says being anti-Trump is “PROBABLY ILLEGAL!!!”
November 1, 2025 at 10:20 PM
Trump says being anti-Trump is “PROBABLY ILLEGAL!!!”
ICYMI, my latest essay in @thedriftmag.com, which also serves as a postscript of sorts to Make Your Own Job www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Shitty Life
Self-Help Gets Philosophical
www.thedriftmag.com
November 1, 2025 at 5:32 PM
ICYMI, my latest essay in @thedriftmag.com, which also serves as a postscript of sorts to Make Your Own Job www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
Reposted by Erik Baker
In the 1st question of his brief interview with Mamdani. Anderson Cooper reports Trump’s strongman threats to punish NYC if the Mayoral candidate is elected, as if he gets to select where funding goes according to his whims, & then asks whether voters will find it “worth the hassle” to vote for him.
November 1, 2025 at 12:57 PM
In the 1st question of his brief interview with Mamdani. Anderson Cooper reports Trump’s strongman threats to punish NYC if the Mayoral candidate is elected, as if he gets to select where funding goes according to his whims, & then asks whether voters will find it “worth the hassle” to vote for him.
Proud of my hometown for standing up to these fascist thugs
Video taken by Jay Shefsky at 12:20 p.m. after the crash happened, Oakton Street/Asbury Avenue in Evanston, IL
October 31, 2025 at 9:11 PM
Proud of my hometown for standing up to these fascist thugs
Reposted by Erik Baker
De lo mejor que he leído en mucho tiempo: @erikmbaker.bsky.social en @thedriftmag.com sobre el giro estoico de la literatura de autoayuda. «But preemptive surrender is no sign of wisdom. Any reality made by human beings can be remade by them».
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Shitty Life
Self-Help Gets Philosophical
www.thedriftmag.com
October 31, 2025 at 5:04 PM
De lo mejor que he leído en mucho tiempo: @erikmbaker.bsky.social en @thedriftmag.com sobre el giro estoico de la literatura de autoayuda. «But preemptive surrender is no sign of wisdom. Any reality made by human beings can be remade by them».
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
Reposted by Erik Baker
I have an essay on self-help, the "philosophy" industry, and human finitude in our new issue. As Dylan said of "Tangled Up In Blue," it took me ten years to live and two to write. I hope you enjoy. www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
October 31, 2025 at 2:00 PM
I have an essay on self-help, the "philosophy" industry, and human finitude in our new issue. As Dylan said of "Tangled Up In Blue," it took me ten years to live and two to write. I hope you enjoy. www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
Reposted by Erik Baker
“To imagine yourself as a modern-day Seneca, a sage liberated from the cares afflicting more ordinary souls, is its own form of self-indulgence,” @erikmbaker.bsky.social argues in his Issue Sixteen essay on self-help philosophy.
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Shitty Life
Self-Help Gets Philosophical
www.thedriftmag.com
October 31, 2025 at 2:02 PM
“To imagine yourself as a modern-day Seneca, a sage liberated from the cares afflicting more ordinary souls, is its own form of self-indulgence,” @erikmbaker.bsky.social argues in his Issue Sixteen essay on self-help philosophy.
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
I have an essay on self-help, the "philosophy" industry, and human finitude in our new issue. As Dylan said of "Tangled Up In Blue," it took me ten years to live and two to write. I hope you enjoy. www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
October 31, 2025 at 2:00 PM
I have an essay on self-help, the "philosophy" industry, and human finitude in our new issue. As Dylan said of "Tangled Up In Blue," it took me ten years to live and two to write. I hope you enjoy. www.thedriftmag.com/how-i-learne...
Reposted by Erik Baker
Terrific new short story by Nick Foretek out today. If you share it enough I'm confident we can get this to be the top result when someone searches "porn" on the internet www.thedriftmag.com/porn/
Porn
Fiction
www.thedriftmag.com
October 29, 2025 at 3:42 PM
Terrific new short story by Nick Foretek out today. If you share it enough I'm confident we can get this to be the top result when someone searches "porn" on the internet www.thedriftmag.com/porn/
Reposted by Erik Baker
If you haven't heard this great episode of This Guy Sucked with @erikmbaker.bsky.social on Elton Mayo, go and listen to it (especially if you're in the, uh, "Fake Doctor in a Business School" demo 🙋)
music.youtube.com/watch?v=uQ85...
music.youtube.com/watch?v=uQ85...
Elton Mayo with Erik Baker
YouTube video by This Guy Sucked
music.youtube.com
October 29, 2025 at 8:47 PM
If you haven't heard this great episode of This Guy Sucked with @erikmbaker.bsky.social on Elton Mayo, go and listen to it (especially if you're in the, uh, "Fake Doctor in a Business School" demo 🙋)
music.youtube.com/watch?v=uQ85...
music.youtube.com/watch?v=uQ85...
Reposted by Erik Baker
“The squelch is a metonym for their sexual intercourse.” In Nick Foretek’s Issue Sixteen short story, a trauma surgeon attends a pornographic fiction workshop.
www.thedriftmag.com/porn/
www.thedriftmag.com/porn/
Porn
Fiction
www.thedriftmag.com
October 29, 2025 at 3:09 PM
“The squelch is a metonym for their sexual intercourse.” In Nick Foretek’s Issue Sixteen short story, a trauma surgeon attends a pornographic fiction workshop.
www.thedriftmag.com/porn/
www.thedriftmag.com/porn/
Terrific new short story by Nick Foretek out today. If you share it enough I'm confident we can get this to be the top result when someone searches "porn" on the internet www.thedriftmag.com/porn/
Porn
Fiction
www.thedriftmag.com
October 29, 2025 at 3:42 PM
Terrific new short story by Nick Foretek out today. If you share it enough I'm confident we can get this to be the top result when someone searches "porn" on the internet www.thedriftmag.com/porn/
Reposted by Erik Baker
Classroom report:
This week in a gen ed course about work, we're finishing this very good book by Erik Baker (@erikmbaker.bsky.social). It's good in the classroom, great on the history, and right on the politics. Read it, share it, teach it.
This week in a gen ed course about work, we're finishing this very good book by Erik Baker (@erikmbaker.bsky.social). It's good in the classroom, great on the history, and right on the politics. Read it, share it, teach it.
Make Your Own Job — Harvard University Press
A sweeping new history of the changing meaning of work in the United States, from Horatio Alger to Instagram influencers.How Americans think about work changed profoundly over the course of the twenti...
www.hup.harvard.edu
October 28, 2025 at 3:11 PM
Classroom report:
This week in a gen ed course about work, we're finishing this very good book by Erik Baker (@erikmbaker.bsky.social). It's good in the classroom, great on the history, and right on the politics. Read it, share it, teach it.
This week in a gen ed course about work, we're finishing this very good book by Erik Baker (@erikmbaker.bsky.social). It's good in the classroom, great on the history, and right on the politics. Read it, share it, teach it.