Description of Sweatshop Warriors.
Sweatshop Warriors highlights the voices of
the pioneers of the growing anti-sweatshop movement: immigrant women workers!
In this up-close and personal look at these extraordinary
women worker-activists, Miriam Ching Yoon Louie records the voices of
these working-class heroines sounding the charge for the anti-WTO legions. Sweatshop
Warriors highlights the role played by workers’ centers in pioneering
new methods for winning victories against global capital. The women reflect
on gender and class conflicts within their families, their unions, and their
ethnic communities, documenting the power that can be unleashed when women workers
break through patriarchal and racial silencing to solve their problems. Summarizing
the histories of Chinese, Mexican, and Korean immigration, Sweatshop Warriors
examines the practices and policies that propel women, men, and children into
dangerous and poorly paid jobs.
With chapters on successful campaigns against Levi-Strauss,
Donna Karan, and restaurants in Los Angeles’ Koreatown, among others.
Table of Contents
Introduction
Listening to the Women
1
Holding Up Half the Sky: Chinese Immigrant Women Workers
2
ˇLa Mujer Luchando, El Mundo Transformando!: Mexican Immigrant Women Workers
3
"Each Day I Go Home with a New Wound in My Heart": Korean Immigrant
Women Workers
4
Extended Families
5
Movement Roots
6
"Just-in-Time" Guerrilla Warriors
Conclusion
Returning to the Source
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Excerpt
From the Introduction: “Listening to the Women The Real
Experts”
Outtake #1: What 60 Minutes Cut
In
December 1994, 12 Chinese seamstresses sit perched on the edge of their seats
in the workers’ center that has become their second home: Asian Immigrant
Women Advocates’ in Oakland’s Chinatown. Together with an estimated
viewing audience of between 23 and 36 million people, these women are about
to watch a 60 Minutes segment on the garment industry’s labor practices
that will include footage of correspondent Morley Safer interviewing them.
For
over two years, the women have been fighting a bitter battle with San Francisco
garment manufacturer Jessica McClintock to recoup unpaid wages and demand corporate
responsibility. When 60 Minutes producers approached them for interviews,
they had agonized about whether to go on camera without the protection of masks
or blurred images. Being seen means running the risk of getting fired and blacklisted.
The producers argued that the women could tell their story most effectively
if they showed their faces and spoke directly to the American public. After
much discussion, the garment workers had finally agreed.
The
seamstresses watch as the camera zooms in. They see themselves beginning to
describe in their native tongues how the sweatshop boss threatened them and
posted signs ordering, “No loud talking” and “Do ...
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Praise
“A
beautifully written review of [sweatshop women workers'] lives, struggles, lessons
learned, and lessons for all of us.…An in-depth study, packed with information,
rich in social, political, and economic analysis.…Totally alive.”
—Elizabeth Martínez, The Nation
“A
powerful account of contemporary immigrant women workers' struggles in the United
States.…What distinguishes Sweatshop Warriors from other books that
highlight the lives of low-wage workers is its illustration of the women's 'painful
yet liberating' transformation from worker to warriors.…Their stories of
strength and empowerment are an inspiration to labor activists around the world.”
—Molly McGrath and Erin McGrath, The Progressive
“I
teach a course on Women and Work and Miriam Ching Louie's Sweatshop Warriors
is the first book I have found that really describes sweatshops from the
workers' perspectives, as agents rather than victims. The students really got
it. I plan to use the book in this course from now on.”
—Laura Tabili, History Department, University of Arizona
“An
important and insightful look at sweatshops in the United States.…Sweatshop
Warriors has an additional value in that it puts the immigrant question
squarely on the table.…Louie is to be applauded for this book. Activists
should make it a point to study it...
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