Real Fake/Fake Real: Pro-Wrestling’s Kayfabe Conundrum
An anthropologist takes on pro-wrestling at the intersection of gig-economy precariousness and post-truth politics.
Reclaiming a Coal Town
When the coal business tanked in the 1930s, the company town of Pardeesville, Pennsylvania, briefly transformed itself through collective action.
The Working Class Roots of Canadian Feminism
The increased participation of women in labor helped create the Canadian feminist movement.
Who Does the Drudge Work? Answers from Edwardian Britain
In 1909, Kathlyn Oliver called for the creation of a servants' trade union that was “as important to the community as the worker[s] in any other sphere."
The Flint Sit-Down Strike, From the Inside
Americans in "The Great Resignation" and "Strikevember" are the heirs of the 1936-1937 sit-down strike by auto workers in Flint, Michigan.
How Show Business Went Union
Since the nineteenth century, the IATSE union has organized behind-the-scenes workers, first in theater, then in the movies.
Black Camerawoman Jessie Maple’s Fight to Join a Union
Her climb into filmmaking began with programs designed to train African Americans. But to succeed, she needed to break into a mostly white male union.
The Woman Teacher Documents a Feminist Labor Union’s Victory
The UK’s National Union of Women Teachers went from splinter group to union in its own right, winning on equal pay—as The Woman Teacher shows first-hand.
How the Artists Union Shook Up the New Deal
When artists showed solidarity with one another and the larger labor movement, they won federal patronage.
Superbarrio: The People’s Superhero
Defender of the poor tenants and evictor of the voracious landlords, a masked lucha libre wrestler rose from the ruins of Mexico City’s 1985 earthquake.