Workers Across the Americas: The Transnational Turn in Labor History by Leon Fin

Publisher Description

The first major volume to place U.S.-centered labor history in a transnational focus, Workers Across the Americas collects the newest scholarship of Canadianist, Caribbeanist, and Latin American specialists as well as U.S. historians. These essays highlight both the supra- and sub-national aspect of selected topics without neglecting nation-states themselves as historical forces. Indeed, the transnational focus opens new avenues for understanding changesin the concepts, policies, and practice of states, their interactions with each other and their populations, and the ways in which the popular classes resist, react, and advance their interests.What does this transnational turn encompass? And what are its likely perils as well as promise as a framework for research and analysis? To address these questions John French, Julie Greene, Neville Kirk, Aviva Chomsky, Dirk Hoerder, and Vic Satzewich lead off the volume with critical commentaries on the project of transnational labor history. Their responses offer a tour of explanations, tensions, and cautions in the evolution of a new arena of research and writing.Thereafter, Workers Across the Americas groups fifteen research essays around themes of labor and empire, indigenous peoples and labor systems, international feminism and reproductive labor, laborrecruitment and immigration control, transnational labor politics, and labor internationalism. Topics range from military labor in the British Empire to coffee workers on the Guatemalan/Mexican border to the role of the International Labor Organization in attempting to set common labor standards. Leading scholars introduce each section and recommend further reading.

Table of Contents

PrefaceLeon FinkI. Beyond Borders: The Challenge of Transnational Labor HistoryIntroduction: Another 'World' History Is Possible: Latin Americanist Reflections on Translocal, Transnational, and Global HistoryJohn FrenchChapter 1: Historians of the World: Transnational Forces, Nation-States, and the Practice of U.S. HistoryJulie GreeneChapter 2: Transnational Labor History: Promise and PerilsNeville KirkChapter 3: Labor History as World History: Linking Regions over TimeAviva ChomskyChapter 4: Overlapping Spaces: Transregional and TransculturalDirk HoerderChapter 5: Transnational Migration: A New Historical Phenomenon?Vic SatzewichII. Labor and EmpireIntroductionAlex LichtensteinChapter 6: "Black service . . . white money": The Peculiar Institution of Military Labor in the British Army during the Seven Years' WarPeter WayChapter 7: "We Speak the Same Language in the New World": Capital, Class, and Community in Mexico's "American Century"Steven BachelorIII. Indigenous Peoples and Labor SystemsIntroductionColleen O'NeillChapter 8: Indigenous Labor in Mid-Nineteenth-Century British North America: The Mi'kmaq of Cape Breton and Squamish of British Columbia in Comparative PerspectiveAndrew ParnabyChapter 9: "De Facto Mexicans": Coffee Workers and Nationality on the Guatemalan/Mexican Border, 1931-1941Catherine Nolan-FerrellIV. International Feminism and Reproductive LaborIntroductionPremilla NadasenChapter 10: "No Right to Layettes or Nursing Time": Maternity Leave and the Question of United States ExceptionalismEileen BorisChapter 11: The Battle Within the Home: International Women's Year 1975 and the Debate Over Development Feminism, and the Commodification of Caring LaborsJocelyn OlcottV. Labor Recruitment and Immigration ControlIntroductionCamille Guérin-GonzalesChapter 12: Feminizing White Slavery in the United States: Marcus Braun and the Transnational Traffic in White Bodies, 1890-1910Gunther PeckChapter 13: Patronage and Progress: The Bracero Program from the Perspective of MexicoMichael SnodgrassChapter 14: Unspoken Exclusions: Race, Nation, and Empire in the Immigration Restrictions of the 1920s in North America and the Greater CaribbeanLara PutnamVI. Transnational Labor PoliticsIntroductionBryan D. PalmerChapter 15: Reclaiming Political Space: Workers, Municipal Socialism and the Reconstruction of Local Democracy in Transnational PerspectiveShelton StromquistChapter 16: A Migrating Revolution: Mexican Political Organizers and their Rejection of American Assimilation, 1920-40John H. FloresVII. Labor InternationalismIntroductionNelson LichtensteinChapter 17: Fugitive Slaves Across North AmericaJeffrey R. Kerr-RitchieChapter 18: Movable Type: Toronto's Transnational Printers, 1866-1872Jacob RemesChapter 19: Global Sea or National Backwater? The ILO, Protective Subsidies, and the Shoals of SolidarityLeon FinkContributorsIndex

Review

"Labor historians have been slow to respond to the conceptual challenges posed by globalization, but this extraordinary collection more than makes up for the lag. Leon Fink has drawn together an impressive range of new transnational scholarship in an indispensable volume that breathes coherence and depth into a vital emerging field."--Brian Kelly, Queen's University Belfast"I'm convinced that this carefully edited collection of essays will be a standard reference for ten years or more. Based on solid empirical research and unconventional theorizing, Workers Across the Americas connects many areas of interest that working-class historians have either neglected or considered in isolation for too long. It explores connections between the Caribbean, Latin America, and North America. It takes reproductive, indigenous, and militarywork seriously. And it begins to integrate the histories of 'free' and 'unfree' labor. I find this book a great source of inspiration."--Marcel van der Linden, International Institute of Social History

Promotional

Offers new context for understanding today's globalization conflicts

Long Description

The first major volume to place U.S.-centered labor history in a transnational focus, Workers Across the Americas collects the newest scholarship of Canadianist, Caribbeanist, and Latin American specialists as well as U.S. historians. These essays highlight both the supra- and sub-national aspect of selected topics without neglecting nation-states themselves as historical forces. Indeed, the transnational focus opens new avenues for understanding changes
in the concepts, policies, and practice of states, their interactions with each other and their populations, and the ways in which the popular classes resist, react, and advance their interests. What does this transnational turn encompass? And what are its likely perils as well as promise
as a framework for research and analysis? To address these questions John French, Julie Greene, Neville Kirk, Aviva Chomsky, Dirk Hoerder, and Vic Satzewich lead off the volume with critical commentaries on the project of transnational labor history. Their responses offer a tour of explanations, tensions, and cautions in the evolution of a new arena of research and writing. Thereafter, Workers Across the Americas groups fifteen research essays around themes of labor and empire,
indigenous peoples and labor systems, international feminism and reproductive labor, labor recruitment and immigration control, transnational labor politics, and labor internationalism. Topics range from military labor in the British Empire to coffee workers on the Guatemalan/Mexican border to the role of the
International Labor Organization in attempting to set common labor standards. Leading scholars introduce each section and recommend further reading.

Review Text

"Labor historians have been slow to respond to the conceptual challenges posed by globalization, but this extraordinary collection more than makes up for the lag. Leon Fink has drawn together an impressive range of new transnational scholarship in an indispensable volume that breathes coherence and depth into a vital emerging field."-Brian Kelly, Queen's University Belfast
"I'm convinced that this carefully edited collection of essays will be a standard reference for ten years or more. Based on solid empirical research and unconventional theorizing, Workers Across the Americas connects many areas of interest that working-class historians have either neglected or considered in isolation for too long. It explores connections between the Caribbean, Latin America, and North America. It takes reproductive, indigenous, and military
work seriously. And it begins to integrate the histories of 'free' and 'unfree' labor. I find this book a great source of inspiration." -Marcel van der Linden, International Institute of Social History

Review Quote

"Labor historians have been slow to respond to the conceptual challenges posed by globalization, but this extraordinary collection more than makes up for the lag. Leon Fink has drawn together an impressive range of new transnational scholarship in an indispensable volume that breathes coherence and depth into a vital emerging field."-Brian Kelly, Queen's University Belfast "I'm convinced that this carefully edited collection of essays will be a standard reference for ten years or more. Based on solid empirical research and unconventional theorizing, Workers Across the Americas connects many areas of interest that working-class historians have either neglected or considered in isolation for too long. It explores connections between the Caribbean, Latin America, and North America. It takes reproductive, indigenous, and military work seriously. And it begins to integrate the histories of 'free' and 'unfree' labor. I find this book a great source of inspiration." -Marcel van der Linden, International Institute of Social History

Feature

LAWCHA (Labor and Working-Class History Association), World History Association, AHA, OAH, Southern Conference of Labor Studies, North American Labor History Conference, Canadian Historical Association, Latin American Studies Association
Selling point: a six-part debate about the future of transnational historical work
Selling point: unparalleled grouping of Canadian, Caribbean, Latin Americanist, and US history experts
Selling point: offers new context for understanding today's globalization conflicts

Details