labor organizing
October 17, 2024 -
Paul Ortiz joined the Southern Labor Studies Association's Working History podcast to discuss higher education organizing in Florida and the history of higher education labor in the South.
May 23, 2023 -
We spoke with workers involved in a successful organizing drive at a Starbucks store in Louisiana's biggest city to find out what they previously thought about unions, and how the effort has changed their thinking.
April 28, 2023 -
Workers at a Tyson Foods chicken processing plant in Van Buren, Arkansas, walked out for several days this month, saying the company is putting their health and safety at risk — and is now shoving them out the door after hailing their loyalty through a deadly pandemic.
February 23, 2023 -
Goat in the Road Productions of New Orleans recently presented an immersive play about a family of Sicilian grocers deciding whether to make common cause with Black/Creole grocers during the city's 1892 general strike. They were joined by community partners Step Up Louisiana and the New Orleans Workers' Center for Racial Justice to help raise awareness about the history behind the drama.
January 11, 2023 -
The U.S. dollar store industry is booming, but its workers struggle with low pay and dangerous working conditions. In New Orleans, they're organizing with help from Step Up Louisiana, a community-based organization that builds power to win economic justice.
December 14, 2022 -
Workers who handle customer service for Medicare and the Affordable Care Act marketplace are fighting to improve their lot at a call center in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, operated by Maximus, a Virginia-based government services contractor. Documentarian Jason Kerzinski recently visited with the workers to collect some of their stories.
September 1, 2022 -
When North Carolina tobacco companies began manufacturing cigarettes in the 1880s, they needed skilled rollers, so they turned to Jewish immigrants on strike at cigarette factories in New York City. The bosses thought the workers wouldn't dare organize in the union-hostile South, but they were proven wrong.