Black folk: the roots of the Black working class
Author:
Publisher:
Liveright Publishing Corporation, a division of W.W. Norton & Company
Publication Date:
[2023]
Edition:
First edition
Language:
English
Description
There have been countless books, articles, and televised reports in recent years about the almost mythic "white working class," a tide of commentary that has obscured the labor, and even the very existence, of entire groups of working people, including everyday Black workers. In this brilliant corrective, Black Folk, acclaimed historian Blair LM Kelley restores the Black working class to the center of the American story. Spanning two hundred years--from one of Kelley's earliest known ancestors, an enslaved blacksmith, to the essential workers of the Covid-19 pandemic-- this book highlights the lives of the laundresses, Pullman porters, domestic maids, and postal workers who established the Black working class as a force in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Taking jobs white people didn't want and confined to segregated neighborhoods, Black workers found community in intimate spaces, from stoops on city streets to the backyards of washerwomen, where multiple generations labored from dawn to dusk, talking and laughing in a space free of white supervision and largely beyond white knowledge. As millions of Black people left the violence of the American South for the promise of a better life in the North and West, these networks of resistance and joy sustained early arrivals and newcomers alike and laid the groundwork for organizing for better jobs, better pay, and equal rights. As her narrative moves from Georgia to Philadelphia, Florida to Chicago, Texas to Oakland, Kelley treats Black workers not just as laborers, or members of a class, or activists, but as people whose daily experiences mattered--to themselves, to their communities, and to a nation that denied that basic fact. Through affecting portraits of her great-grandfather, a sharecropper named Solicitor, and her grandmother, Brunell, who worked for more than a decade as a domestic maid, Kelley captures, in intimate detail, how generation after generation of labor was required to improve, and at times maintain, her family's status. Yet her family, like so many others, was always animated by a vision of a better future. The church yards, factory floors, railcars, and postal sorting facilities where Black people worked were sites of possibility, and, as Kelley suggests, Amazon package processing centers, supermarkets, and nursing homes can be the same today. With the resurgence of labor activism in our own time, this is a stirring history of our possible future.--
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Subjects
Subjects
African Americans
African Americans -- Economic conditions
African Americans -- Employment -- History
Economic conditions
Employment
Family
History
Kelley, Blair Murphy
Kelley, Blair Murphy, -- 1973- -- Family
Labor
Labor -- United States -- History
Race relations
United States -- Race relations
Working class African Americans
Working class African Americans -- History
African Americans -- Economic conditions
African Americans -- Employment -- History
Economic conditions
Employment
Family
History
Kelley, Blair Murphy
Kelley, Blair Murphy, -- 1973- -- Family
Labor
Labor -- United States -- History
Race relations
United States -- Race relations
Working class African Americans
Working class African Americans -- History
More Details
ISBN:
9781631496554
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Grouping Information
Grouped Work ID | bbf352b7-bd03-fb1c-ad2e-a57abd4250df |
---|---|
Grouping Title | black folk the roots of the black working class |
Grouping Author | blair murphy kelley |
Grouping Category | book |
Grouping Language | English (eng) |
Last Grouping Update | 2024-09-13 17:29:37PM |
Last Indexed | 2024-09-18 02:22:05AM |
Solr Fields
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author
Kelley, Blair Murphy, 1973-
author_display
Kelley, Blair Murphy
available_at_boulder
Boulder Main Library
NoBo Branch Library
NoBo Branch Library
detailed_location_boulder
Boulder Main Adult NonFiction
Boulder NoBo Adult NonFiction
Boulder NoBo Adult NonFiction
display_description
There have been countless books, articles, and televised reports in recent years about the almost mythic "white working class," a tide of commentary that has obscured the labor, and even the very existence, of entire groups of working people, including everyday Black workers. In this brilliant corrective, Black Folk, acclaimed historian Blair LM Kelley restores the Black working class to the center of the American story. Spanning two hundred years--from one of Kelley's earliest known ancestors, an enslaved blacksmith, to the essential workers of the Covid-19 pandemic-- this book highlights the lives of the laundresses, Pullman porters, domestic maids, and postal workers who established the Black working class as a force in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Taking jobs white people didn't want and confined to segregated neighborhoods, Black workers found community in intimate spaces, from stoops on city streets to the backyards of washerwomen, where multiple generations labored from dawn to dusk, talking and laughing in a space free of white supervision and largely beyond white knowledge. As millions of Black people left the violence of the American South for the promise of a better life in the North and West, these networks of resistance and joy sustained early arrivals and newcomers alike and laid the groundwork for organizing for better jobs, better pay, and equal rights. As her narrative moves from Georgia to Philadelphia, Florida to Chicago, Texas to Oakland, Kelley treats Black workers not just as laborers, or members of a class, or activists, but as people whose daily experiences mattered--to themselves, to their communities, and to a nation that denied that basic fact. Through affecting portraits of her great-grandfather, a sharecropper named Solicitor, and her grandmother, Brunell, who worked for more than a decade as a domestic maid, Kelley captures, in intimate detail, how generation after generation of labor was required to improve, and at times maintain, her family's status. Yet her family, like so many others, was always animated by a vision of a better future. The church yards, factory floors, railcars, and postal sorting facilities where Black people worked were sites of possibility, and, as Kelley suggests, Amazon package processing centers, supermarkets, and nursing homes can be the same today. With the resurgence of labor activism in our own time, this is a stirring history of our possible future.--
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Books
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itype_boulder
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last_indexed
2024-09-18T08:22:05.027Z
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Non Fiction
literary_form_full
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local_callnumber_boulder
331.639607 Kell
331.6396073 Kell
331.6396073 Kell
owning_library_boulder
Boulder Public Library
owning_location_boulder
Boulder Main Library
NoBo Branch Library
NoBo Branch Library
primary_isbn
9781631496554
publishDate
2023
publisher
Liveright Publishing Corporation, a division of W.W. Norton & Company
recordtype
grouped_work
subject_facet
African Americans -- Economic conditions
African Americans -- Employment -- History
Kelley, Blair Murphy, -- 1973- -- Family
Labor -- United States -- History
United States -- Race relations
Working class African Americans -- History
African Americans -- Employment -- History
Kelley, Blair Murphy, -- 1973- -- Family
Labor -- United States -- History
United States -- Race relations
Working class African Americans -- History
title_display
Black folk : the roots of the Black working class
title_full
Black folk : the roots of the Black working class / Blair LM Kelley
title_short
Black folk
title_sub
the roots of the Black working class
topic_facet
African Americans
Economic conditions
Employment
Family
History
Kelley, Blair Murphy
Labor
Race relations
Working class African Americans
Economic conditions
Employment
Family
History
Kelley, Blair Murphy
Labor
Race relations
Working class African Americans
Solr Details Tables
item_details
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ils:.b30803238 | .i48779179 | Boulder NoBo Adult NonFiction | 331.639607 Kell | 1 | false | false | On Shelf | bnnfa | |||||
ils:.b30803238 | .i4788213x | Broomfield Non-Fiction | 331.6396 Kelle | 1 | false | false | On Shelf | Nov 12, 2023 | mdnfa | ||||
ils:.b30803238 | .i47941777 | Boulder Main Adult NonFiction | 331.6396073 Kell | 1 | false | false | On Shelf | Oct 07, 2023 | bmnfa |
record_details
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