Less than sixty years ago, the plight of the country’s most vulnerable migrant farm workers shocked millions of Americans after many of whom had just enjoyed their biggest meal of the year. Since it first aired after Thanksgiving Day in 1960, “Harvest of Shame” has become one of the seminal documentaries in the history of American broadcast journalism. Not only was it a significant contribution to the anti-poverty movement in the 1960s, it also exposed the plight of migrant workers in American and their brutal living conditions in which leading journalist Edward R. Murrow described as “wrong the dignity of man” (Harvest of Shame). The shocking and continuous parallels between the film and John Steinbeck’s “The Harvest Gypsies” reflect the …show more content…
The film opens with a crowd of African-Americans looking for jobs (Harvest of Shame). As employers yell out the daily wage, men and women are tightly packed onto large trucks headed to the fields (Harvest of Shame). One farmer describes the scene, “we used to own our slaves…now we just rent them” (Harvest of Shame). This shows that even though slavery has been abolished, unfair treatment towards African-American workers still exist. Even though African-American workers existed in the 1930s, they were generally excluded in Steinbeck’s article. Their heavy presence in the film not only highlights the continued mistreatment of migrant farm laborers, especially African-Americans, but also how the Civil Rights Movement was “a black freedom movement’s fight for jobs and justices” (MacLean 4). As evident through the film, African-Americans were consistently suppressed by employers which contributed to igniting the fire for “economic citizenship” during the Civil Rights Movement (Martínez-Matsuda 10 November …show more content…
By showing it after Thanksgiving Day, the film startled and astonished many of its viewers as the images of dirty shacks and hungry children did not square with the large feast of Thanksgiving. “Were it not for the labor of the people you are going to meet, you might not starve, but your table would not be laden with the luxuries that we have all come to regard as essentials” (Harvest of Shame). Furthermore, the film did contribute to the wave of social awareness and activism in the 1960s. Public outcry helped propel the plight of farm laborers on to the nation’s political agenda. In 1962, Congress passed the Migrant Health Act which financed clinics, immunization, and prenatal and natal care (Knebel 1132). However, real progress was elusive as many agricultural businesses launched an offensive to block further attempts at reforms and wage increases by lobbying lawmakers (Knebel 1132). While Murrow and the film had limited legislative impact, it galvanized public opinion and ignited a movement towards helping migrant
Hunter begins her analysis by integrating the experiences of African-American women workers into the broader examination of political and economic conditions in the New South. According to Hunter, the period between 1877 and 1915 is critical to understanding the social transformations in most southern cities and complicating this transformation are the issues of race, class, and gender. The examination of the lives of black domestic workers reveals the complexity of their struggles to keep their autonomy with white employers and city officials. For example, African-American women built institutions and frequently quit their jobs in response to the attempts by southern whites to control their labor and mobility. Hunter carefully situates these individual tactics of resistance in the New South capitalist development and attempts by whites to curtail the political and social freedoms of emancipated slaves.
Between the years of 1840 and 1914, about forty million people immigrated to the United States from foreign countries. Many of them came to find work and earn money to have a better life for their families. Others immigrated because they wanted to escape the corrupt political power of their homelands, such as the revolution in Mexico after 1911. Whatever the case, many found it difficult to begin again in a new country. Most immigrants lived in slums with very poor living conditions. They had a hard time finding work that paid enough to support a family. Not only was it difficult for immigrant men, but for women as well. Immigrant women faced many challenges including lack of education and social life as well as low wages and poor working conditions.
African-American labor was beginning to be more valuable than white labor. African laborers were beginning to be looked at as property, as well as being treated that way. By the 1660’s, the status of the African ...
Since the beginning of slavery in the America, Africans have been deemed inferior to the whites whom exploited the Atlantic slave trade. Africans were exported and shipped in droves to the Americas for the sole purpose of enriching the lives of other races with slave labor. These Africans were sold like livestock and forced into a life of servitude once they became the “property” of others. As the United States expanded westward, the desire to cultivate new land increased the need for more slaves. The treatment of slaves was dependent upon the region because different crops required differing needs for cultivation. Slaves in the Cotton South, concluded traveler Frederick Law Olmsted, worked “much harder and more unremittingly” than those in the tobacco regions.1 Since the birth of America and throughout its expansion, African Americans have been fighting an uphill battle to achieve freedom and some semblance of equality. While African Americans were confronted with their inferior status during the domestic slave trade, when performing their tasks, and even after they were set free, they still made great strides in their quest for equality during the nineteenth century.
“I do not believe that many American citizens . . . really wanted to create such immense human suffering . . . in the name of battling illegal immigration” (Carr 70). For hundreds of years, there has been illegal immigration starting from slavery, voluntary taking others from different countries to work in different parts of the world, to one of the most popular- Mexican immigration to the United States. Mexican immigration has been said to be one of the most common immigration acts in the world. Although the high demand to keep immigrants away from crossing the border, Mexicans that have immigrated to the U.S have made an impact on the American culture because of their self sacrifices on the aspiration to cross over. Then conditions
Burgers, soda and other “junk food” are—along with obesity—part of the American life. For that matter, it is very common for doctors in the US to urge people to consume more fresh products. Yet, paradoxically choosing this healthy diet comes with a huge price on migrant workers’ bodies. In Fresh Fruits Broken Bodies, physician and anthropologist Seth Holmes explores the structural violence perpetrated against migrant farmworkers. Throughout this 200-pages book, Holmes makes a thoughtful description of the life of the Triqui migrant farm workers and how structural forces play out in the harsh working and living conditions they experience.
In Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies, Seth Holmes gives readers an inside perspective as to what life is like for migrant farmworkers living in the U.S. He looks at the health of the of these farmworkers which he believes is being undermined by factors of racial prejudice, supply and demand, and migration. The book is about Holmes journey with these migrant workers told in a way that puts these farmworkers on a personal level instead of just being seen as labor in the fields. Holmes discovers is that these farmworkers are living in harsh conditions that are detrimental to their health. This book doesn’t just tell the story of these farmworkers, it also acts a way of getting the message out that something needs to be changed in the way that farmworkers
These workers “connected their freedom and their work” which created a gap in status over slaves and even freed slaves as they were considered the “antithesis of republican citizens” because of their inability to defend themselves. (33&36) Roediger quotes Franklin and Jefferson in their written articles which debate this thinking from an artisan point of view, but it was not fully accepted en masse. This mindset expediated the formation of white working-class racism who would continue to separate themselves from Blacks through use of
The. Kessner, Thomas and Betty Boyd Caroli, “Today’s Immigrants, Their Stories.” Kiniry and Rose, 343-346. Print. The. Portes, Alejandro and Ruben G. Rumbaut, “Immigrant America: A Portrait.” Kiniry and Rose, 336-337.
At the turn of the Twentieth Century America is one generation removed from the civil war. For African Americans times are supposed to be improving following the Reconstruction of the south and the ratification of the 15th amendment. Except, in actuality life is still extremely tough for the vast majority of African Americans. Simultaneously, the birthing of the industrial revolution is taking place in America and a clear social divide in daily livelihood and economic prosperity is forming across the country. This time is known as the Gilded Age because as the metaphor emphasizes, only a thin layer of wealth and prosperity of America’s elite robber barons is masking the immense amount of impoverished American laborers. Among the vast majority
To say that immigrants in America have experienced discrimination would be an understatement. Ever since the country formed, they have been seen as inferior, such as African-Americans that were unwillingly brought to the 13 colonies in the 17th century with the intention to be used as slaves. However, post-1965, immigrants, mainly from Central and South America, came here by choice. Many came with their families, fleeing from their native land’s poverty; these immigrants were in search of new opportunities, and more importantly, a new life. They faced abuse and Cesar Chavez fought to help bring equality to minorities.
John Steinbeck’s stories depict his commiseration and compassion for the down-trodden class. He, in his stories, has summed up the bitterness of the Great Depression decade and aroused widespread sympathy for the plight of migratory farm workers. His style is natural and lucid.
Harvest Of Shame, an interesting and touching black and white documentary from the early 1960’s, documents and exposes the deploring lives of thousands of American migrant cultural workers narrated and dissected by one of the best and first American broadcast journalists called Edward Roscoe Murrow. The principal objective of this movie is not only to show the poor and miserable lives that all of these people live, but to let all the other Americans who are above these workers on the social and wealth scale know that the people who pick up their fruits, vegetables, and grains have no voice, no power, and no help to battle the inequities and mistreatment they receive.
In the end, Steinbeck’s book The Grapes of Wrath will continue to be debated for many years to come. However, the issue of whether or not it is a working critique of capitalism is settled. His practical criticisms of capitalism are many; his support for socialism in an illusion brought on by further attacks on capitalism, and he demonstrates the damage such a system does on the human spirit. Alas, it is obvious that Steinbeck’s intentions were to conceive a novel that accurately criticized capitalism without any heavy support of a socialist
The words “migrant workers” probably conjures up images of labourers leaving their homeland to seek for hopes and promises of a better future, toiling in an environment that reeks of unfamiliarity. After a day of slogging, they return to shelters they can hardly call home. It’s late. They think of their family back home, the wife who’s exhausted from doing housework all day, and the children who studies so hard in school with the overwhelming thought of quitting school in order to get a job to support the family. The migrant workers are hit with a pang of nostalgia, guilt, and melancholy- all at once. Nevertheless, they have to soldier on, to earn enough keep to support their family back home. It is, to say the least, unjust that they have