Common Thread: Garment Workers Past, Present, Future

(Same as Gender Studies M169 and Labor Studies M108.) Study blends frameworks from economics, labor history, and ethnic studies to offer in-depth exploration of lives and experiences of garment industry workers from early 19th century to present. In contrast to traditional narratives, study locates garment workers—majority of whom are immigrant women—at vanguard of U.S. labor movement, showing how they pioneered new forms of worker education and other social welfare programs, and became leaders in fight for women’s, civil, and immigrant rights. Exploration of garment work relationship to American culture, tracing how sweatshop became symbol of worker exploitation, how popular culture and fashion trends impacted lived realities of workers in those shops, and how racial and gendered expectations shaped public perceptions of garment workers. By doing so, study reveals garment work to be central thread that ties together histories of global trade, industrialization, gender and sexuality, immigration, radicalism, unionization, and American imperialism.

P/NP or letter grading.