posts categorized asLaborOnline

The Strange Career of “the Working Class” in US Political Culture Since the 1950s: An Introduction

by Robyn Muncy on February 15, 2019

The working class currently has remarkable visibility in US political culture. In defiance of a longstanding belief in America’s classlessness, even today’s sitting president publicly acknowledges America’s “working class.” However dramatically Donald Trump is breaking some political norms, though, the particular way he uses the phrase working class is completely consistent with trends that have been emerging within mainstream US politics for decades.

American Socialism, Revisited

by Paul Buhle on February 13, 2019

Paul Buhle reviews The Socialist Party of America: A Complete History, by Jack Ross (2015)

Sleeping Giant: When Public Workers Awake

by Leon Fink on February 6, 2019

It was the radical African-American intellectual, W.E.B. Du Bois, who famously called the mass disaffection and migration of southern slaves to Union battle lines in the Civil War a “general strike.”

The Ghosts of Bisbee

by Mary Romero, Eric Margolis on February 3, 2019

Bisbee ‘17 is a documentary about an Arizona town facing its ghosts. In June 1917, when copper miners organized by the Industrial Workers of the World had gone on strike for two weeks, 1200 striking workers were rounded up and “deported” to New Mexico.

Challenging Trump’s Border Policy in a Song: Alejandro Escovedo’s “Silver City”

by Daniel Graff on January 29, 2019

I write this in the midst of the longest government shutdown in US history — 25 days and counting — idling 800,000 federal workers, disrupting public services, and threatening to push the economy into recession. How did we get here?

Peter Cole on his new book, Dockworker Power

by Jacob Remes, Peter Cole on January 8, 2019

Our series on new books in labor and working-class history continues. The University of Illinois Press published Peter Cole’s second book, Dockworker Power: Race and Activism in Durban and the San Francisco Bay Area, in December. Cole, a professor of history at Western Illinois University, answered questions from Jacob Remes.

Working Class in American History Series: Perspective from Appalachia

by Jessica Wilkerson on December 28, 2018

Editor’s note: This is our 5^th in the series on the celebration and reflections on the anniversary of the University of Illinois Press Working Class in American History. Jessica Wilkerson has just published her first book in this series, and was asked to comment on her personal encounter with the series and labor history.

Working Class in American History Series: A Perspective From the African-American Field

by Joe William Trotter on December 23, 2018

We continue our commentaries about the important contributions and critical reviews of the remarkable Working Class in American History Series, which is celebrating its 40th year in 2018. The series began when labor history as a field was beginning to make inroads into the dominant narratives of U.S.

Writing History with Working People as Central Actors

by Julie Greene on December 20, 2018

The project was imbued with E. P Thompson’s vision of class as a historical relationship, and of course there was his iconic statement in his book, The Making of the English Working Class: “class happens when some men, as a result of common experiences…, feel and articulate the identity of their interests as between themselves and as against other men whose interests are different from theirs…”

The Global Working Class Fights Back

by Sarah Attfield on December 19, 2018

2018 has seen many working-class people around the world standing up for their rights and pushing back against injustice and inequality. Some of these fights have made the mainstream news in western countries, but many have not. As we reflect on the year that is ending, let’s not forget the struggles of working-class people and the successes of collective action and solidarity.

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LAWCHA

The Labor and Working-Class History Association