Archive: Working-Class Perspectives
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WCP: Becky and the Grind
Working one’s way out of poverty, once an attainable ambition for the working-class, has now become a practical impossibility. In this week’s Working-Class Perspectives, Jack Metzgar details the story of Becky, a working-class single mother who struggled to do all she could just to not fall deeper into poverty, and the complex social dynamics of a family trying to support her.
Category: Visiting Scholars
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WCP: Going Public with Working-Class Studies
Discussions on the working-class in media and economics often neglect the depth and nuances of the working-class many academics have become familiar with. In this week’s Working-Class Perspectives, Sherry Linkon addresses the need for working-class studies to be more integrated with lay understandings of the working-class.
Category: Visiting Scholars
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WCP: Scabby the Rat Down Under
In Australia, as in the U.S., increasing restrictions on unions have forced the labor movement to come up with new and creative methods of communication. In this week’s Working-Class Perspectives, Ruth Barton explores the roll of large inflatable animals in Australian labor protests, and how activists have struggled to keep them inflated.
Category: Visiting Scholars
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WCP: Know Your Place: A New Generation of Working-Class Voices
The stories from younger generations of the working-class are becoming increasingly distinct from previous generations. In Working-Class Perspectives, Tim Strangleman reviews Know Your Place, a collection of reflections from young working-class writers, and compares the reflections in the book with his own working-class experiences.
Category: Visiting Scholars
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WCP: Billy Graham and the Evangelical Origins of Organized Labor
Evangelicals and labor unions find themselves on opposite sides of the U.S. political spectrum, but it wasn’t always that way. In this week’s Working-Class Perspective, Ken Estey reflects on Billy Graham’s outreach to working-class people and his understanding that the labor movement had roots in 18th century religious revivals.
Category: Visiting Scholars
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WCP: Have Ohio Democrats Learned Anything About the Working Class?
Although some white working-class voters in swing states like Ohio are growing disillusioned with President Trump, that in itself will not be enough to win their votes come November. In this week’s Working-Class Perspective, John Russo writes that Democrats must offer a strong vision of economic justice to hope for a different outcome this election cycle.
Category: Visiting Scholars
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WCP: Working-Class People on the Snowfields: Class at the Winter Olympics
As stories about the Winter Olympics focus on athletes’ performance and training, the reality is that sports such as skiing, snowboarding, and figure skating are prohibitively expensive for most working-class families. In this week’s Working-Class Perspective, Sarah Attfield examines the unseen but powerful impact of class at these games.
Category: Visiting Scholars
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WCP: Low Cotton: A Class on Class
Students will only understand class politics and working-class culture if it is part of their college curriculum. In this week’s Working-Class Perspective, Helen Diana Eidson describes how she creatively engaged her students at the University of Alabama on the issue of class through the history of Alabama cotton sharecroppers.
Category: Visiting Scholars
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WCP: Uber, “Metropocalypse,” and Economic Inequality in DC
Researchers have already revealed the poor working conditions, high risks, and financial instability that Uber drivers face. In this week’s Working-Class Perspective, Katie Wells, Kafui Attoh, and Declan Cullen show how Uber’s cozy relationship with D.C. policymakers allowed it to pass special rules in its favor. As a result, Washingtonians will likely experience heightened inequality, more discrimination, and worse public transportation.
Category: Visiting Scholars
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WCP: Worker Portraits: Contradictions and Contingencies
Art depicting workers offers contradicting meanings of work in both capturing the dignity and pride of workers but also representing the struggles and hardships of labor. In Working-Class Perspectives, Sherry Linkon reflects on how these tensions manifest in a new exhibit at the National Portrait Gallery and argues that the exhibit neglects the precarious nature of work today.
Category: Visiting Scholars