Working History Working History

Welcome to a new season of Working History! Series co-host Dave Anderson talks with Aimee Loiselle about her book Beyond Norma Rae: How Puerto Rican and Southern White Women Fought for a Place in the American Working Class

This week’s episode features a panel recorded live at the fiftieth anniversary celebration of Southern Exposure magazine, held in March at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill’s Wilson Library. The panel, which reflects on the founding of the Institute for Southern Studies and the creation of Southern Exposure, features Sue Thrasher, a co-founder of the Institute who later worked at the Highlander Center; Leah Wise, one of the Institute’s early staff members and later the director of Southerners for Economic Justice; and Bob Hall, the founding editor of Southern Exposure, who spent many years at the Institute and was the longtime executive director of Democracy North Carolina. It is moderated by Chip Hughes, an early Institute staffer himself and occupational health and safety organizer before a career in public health. Produced in partnership with the Institute for Southern Studies.

Show Notes:

Episode transcription: https://www.facingsouth.org/2023/11/why-we-did-what-we-did-reflections-sue-thrasher-leah-wise-and-bob-hall
Visit the Southern Exposure digital archive: https://www.facingsouth.org/southern-exposure
A note from the archives editor: https://www.facingsouth.org/2023/03/archive-time-crisis
More about the 50th anniversary event: https://www.facingsouth.org/2023/03/gathering-marks-half-century-southern-exposures-founding

Jennifer Brooks, Professor of History at Auburn University, discusses her book Resident Strangers: Immigrant Laborers in New South Alabama, beginning with the book's origin story and then explaining the significance of Chinese and European immigrants in the New South and their interactions with employers, unions, African-Americans, the region's racial regime, and its legal system.

Thomas Castillo discusses his book Working in the Magic City: Moral Economy in Early Twentieth-Century Miami, beginning with the book’s origin story, and then tracing Miami's working-class history from World War I to the mid-1930s.

Jefferson Cowie discusses his book Freedom’s Dominion: A Saga of White Resistance to Federal Power, beginning with the book’s origin story, and then tracing the use of "freedom" to dominate others in Barbour County, Alabama, from Indian Removal in the 1830s through the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s

Find information about the book at the publisher’s page. https://www.basicbooks.com/titles/jefferson-cowie/freedoms-dominion/9781541672819/

Find the New York Times review of the book. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/12/books/review/freedoms-dominion-jefferson-cowie.html

Journalist Victoria Bouloubasis discusses her career reporting on agricultural and food labor in North Carolina, her approach to labor journalism, and how she uses histories in her work.

Show Notes:

"A North Carolina Farmworker Was Accused of Abusing His Workers. Then Big Tobacco Backed His Election," by Ben Stockton and Victoria Bouloubasis, Mother Jones, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, and Enlace Latino NC: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2022/10/tobacco-reynolds-north-carolina-brent-jackson-tbij/

"How a Tobacco Company Funds a Mega-Farmer’s Political Ambitions That Hurt Workers" podcast in English: https://soundcloud.com/enlacelatinoncpodcast/how-a-tobacco-company-funds-a-mega-farmers-political-ambitions-that-hurt-workers

"Cómo una tabacalera financia las ambiciones políticas de granjero que perjudica a los trabajadores" podcast en español: https://soundcloud.com/enlacelatinoncpodcast/como-una-tabacalera-financia-las-ambiciones-politicas-de-un-granjero-que-perjudica-a-los-trabajadores

Victoria's reporting for Enlace Latino NC: https://enlacelatinonc.org/author/victoria-bouloubasis/

Victoria's reporting for Southerly: https://southerlymag.org/author/victoria-bouloubasis/