This is a good question. The title made me think of gritty skills and knowledge that help get the job done, but may not be considered best practices. The list, however, suggests I've misunderstood.

Of course, the author does state,

    > these are books to read so that you can cut motherfuckers with knives. 

but this doesn't clarify a great deal.

Well, I'm not sure a VP would appreciate a tech kniving the prod server, but sometimes it's necessary.

Possibly adjacent to street fighting mathematics or Street Epistemology.

It conveys taking a topic that is normally just used in ivory-tower academic circles and applying it to solve real and immediate problems.

https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/18-098-street-fighting-mathemati...

https://www.streetepistemology.com/what-is-street-epistemolo...