AMST 254 - Workers' Stories, Workers' Lives: Narrative Approaches to U.S. Labor History

Institution:

Williams College

Subject:

American Studies

Description:

This course will use novels, comics, poetry, autobiographies, zines, films, and visits to historic sites as windows into the complex histories of work and working-class life in U.S. history. Reading labor studies texts alongside these literary and cinematic accounts, we will survey major developments in the U.S. economy, labor force, types of work, and the lives of working people. Topics include: the transition from household economies to wage labor; work regimes under slavery; divergent experiences of immigrant labor and cultural assimilation; industrialization and the consumer society; deindustrialization and structural unemployment; the sexual division of labor; and the rise of knowledge and service economies. Throughout, we will focus on ways in which working people cope with or resist the burdens of their work lives and organize to seek greater control over decisions that affect them, including: union organizing, political engagement, stealing, and sharing their own interpretations and representations of their experiences.

Credits:

3.00

Credit Hours:

Prerequisites:

Corequisites:

Exclusions:

Level:

Instructional Type:

Lecture

Notes:

Additional Information:

Historical Version(s):

Institution Website:

www.williams.edu

Phone Number:

(413) 597-3131

Regional Accreditation:

New England Association of Schools and Colleges

Calendar System:

Four-one-four plan

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