HIST 608 U.S. Race and Labor
Course Description
--"Those of us committed to writing working-class history must look
way, way below, to the places where the noble and heroic tradition of
labor militancy is not as evident." Robin D. G. Kelley, Race Rebels
This class explores how race and race relationships have been articulated
through labor struggle and the formation of the U.S. working-class. Our
central focus will be on working women and men of color, or as Robin D.
G. Kelley likes to say, labor history from "way, way below."
Kelley's characterization of, and approach to this history signals the
invisibility of race and people of color in traditional labor history
and the complicated relationship of non-white laborers to mainstream labor
organizations and movements. Readings, discussions, and assignments will
reveal how race and racialization has been (and continues to be) a pivotal
force in the construction and division of the US working-class throughout
the nation's history. Some readings explore the construction of "white"
labor subjectivities as their primary focus, and most readings examine
the intersection of gender, race, ethnicity, and class.
The class is organized by theme, not by chronology, though we will be
reading books about the nineteenth century first, followed by several
books that explore race and labor in the 20th Century. The class is restricted
to graduate students. Specific requirements are listed below, though you
are welcome and encouraged to come see me during my office hours for more
details.
Course Policies
Everyone is responsible for reading the primary book ( ) each week. All
primary books can be purchased at the University of Oregon Bookstore.
There will be four components to your grade: Discussion, book introduction,
book précises, and the historiographical essay. Each is described
below:
Discussion 20%
I expect students to arrive on time and ready to discuss the primary book
for the week. This is admittedly a subjective grade, but I will let you
know if I think your participation needs improvement mid-way through the
term.
Book Introduction 20%
You will be responsible for introducing one primary book for one week
of the term. In the event that we have more than one student per book,
we will double-up in some weeks. In your presentation you will be responsible
for three things: 1) present the main thesis of the primary book; 2) discuss
how it relates to other books in the field; 3) present at least three
questions that challenge the class to think critically about the relationship
between race and labor as it is articulated in the primary book (this
can include a criticism of the author's approach and/or interpretation).
In discussing how the book relates to the field, I have provided an additional
book or books (¨) for you to look at. I strongly recommend that you,
as the presenter, read some or all of these books, and find book reviews
for the primary and additional book. Book introductions begin April 15
and end May 20. They will be assigned on April 8th.
Book Précis 20%
You are responsible for writing a book précis (or book review)
for at least five primary books. The précis must be single spaced,
and limited to one page. Your precise will consist of three paragraphs.
In the first paragraph you will describe the thesis of the book. In the
second paragraph you will describe the methodology used by the author.
In the third (and longest) paragraph, you will state your informed opinion
of the book, comparing it to the field and critically evaluating the author's
interpretation and use of sources. This exercise should be done for all
books, but I am requiring that you hand in only five précises.
This is a good habit to get into, especially for history graduate students
who can use these précises later in preparation for preliminary
exams.
Historiographical Essay 40%
You are responsible for writing an essay discussing at least five books
within a particular field of labor history (e.g. Chicana/o Labor History).
The essay must discuss the books comparatively, and argue how they individually
and collectively define and/or revise their field of study. You may choose
no more than two books from the list of primary books in this syllabus
to discuss in your essay. Your essay should be 18 to 20 pages long, double-spaced.
It is due on or before 1pm, Tuesday, June 10th in my box in Ethnic Studies,
201 McKenzie Hall.
Required Texts
Mike Davis; Prisoners of the American Dream
David Roediger; The Wages of Whiteness
Tera Hunter; Ta' Joy My Freedom
Neil Foley; The White Scourge
Dorothy Fujita-Rony; American Workers, Colonial Power
George Lipsitz; Rainbow at Midnight
Vicki Ruiz; Cannery Women, Cannery Lives
Grace Boggs; Living for Change
Course Schedule
| Week 1 |
Reading |
| April 1 Working-Class History
from Way, Way Below |
Introduction, Kelley, Robin
D. G. Race Rebels: Culture, Politics, and the Black Working Class.
New York: The Free Press, 1994. |
| Week 2 |
Reading |
| April 8 Why the US Working
Class Is Different |
Davis, Mike. Prisoners
of the American Dream. London: Verso, 1986. |
| Week 3 |
Reading |
| April 15 Working-class&
Racial Formation in the White Republic |
Roediger, David R. The
Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class.
London: Verso, 1991.
Arnesen, Eric. "Whiteness and the Historians' Imagination."
International Labor and Working-class History 60 (2001): 3-32.
Saxton, Alexander. The Rise and Fall of the White Republic: Class
Politics and Mass Culture in Nineteenth-Century America. New York:
Verso, 1990. |
| Week 4 |
Reading |
| April 22 Post-bellum Labor
in the US South |
Hunter, Tera W. To 'joy
my freedom: southern Black women's lives and labors after the Civil
War. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1997.
Foner, Eric. A Short History of Reconstruction, 1863-1877. New York:
Perennial Library, 1990. |
| Week 5 |
Reading |
| April 29 Race and Labor
in the Borderlands |
Foley, Neil. The White
Scourge: Mexicans, Blacks, and Poor Whites in Texas Cotton Culture.
Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997.
Zamora, Emilio. The World of the Mexican Worker in Texas. College
Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1993.
Peck, Gunther. Reinventing Free Labor: Padrones and Immigrant Workers
in the North American West, 1880-1930. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2000.
|
| Week 6 |
Reading |
| May 5 Race and Labor on
the Pacific Rim |
Fujita-Rony, Dorothy B.
American Workers, Colonial Power: Philippine Seattle and the Transpacific
West, 1919-1941. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003.
Takaki, Ronald T. Pau Hana: Plantation Life and Labor in Hawai'i,
1835-1920. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1983.
|
| Week 7 |
Reading |
| May 13 World War II |
Lipsitz, George. Rainbow
at Midnight: Labor and Culture in the 1940s. 359 vols. Urbana and
Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1994.
Daniel, Cletus. Chicano Workers and the Politics of Fairness: The
FEPC in the Southwest, 1941-1945. Austin: University of Texas Press,
1991.
González, Gilbert. Labor and Community: Mexican Citrus Worker
Villages in a Southern California County, 1900-1950. Urbana: The University
of Illinois Press, 1994.
|
| Week 8 |
Reading |
| May 20 Race, Gender, and
Labor |
Green, Venus. Race on
the Line: Gender, Labor, and Technology in the Bell System, 1880-1980.
Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2001.
Ruiz, Vicki. Cannery Women, Cannery Lives: Mexican Women, Unionization,
and the California Food Processing Industry, 1930-1950. Albuquerque:
University of New Mexico Press, 1987. |
| Week 9 |
Reading |
| May 27 Native American
Wage Labor |
"Native American
Labor: Retrieving History, Rethinking Theory," in Littlefield,
Alice, and Martha C. Knack, ed. Native Americans and Wage Labor: Ethnohistorical
Perspectives. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1996.
Campbell, Robert B. "Newlands, Old Lands: Native American Labor,
Agrarian Ideology, and the Progressive-Era State in the Making of
the Newlands Reclamation Project, 1902-1926." Pacific Historical
Review 71, no. 2 (2002): 203-238.
O'Neill, Colleen. "The "Making" of the Navajo Worker:
Navajo Households, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and Off-Reseervation
Wage Work, 1948-1960." New Mexico Historical Review 74, no. 4
(1999): 375-405.
|
| Week 10 |
Reading |
| June 3 A Century of Struggle |
Boggs, Grace Lee. Living
for Change: An Autobiography. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota
Press, 1998. |
|
