FALL 1999
This information effective for Fall 1999.
Check with instructor the first day of class for any changes.
252 College Eight
Office Hours: Tuesdays 9-10 am, Wednesdays 1:30-3:30 pm, or by appt. in 312 College Eight,
459-4182, 459-3516 messages; e-mail: zavella@cats.ucsc.edu
The purpose of this course is to explore the relationship between work and family, and the power relations which are organized on the basis of gender and race within the work force and families. We will be examining "work" as having multiple meanings--certainly as wage labor, and how women and men have different experiences historically. Our discussion of work includes occupational segregation in the labor market, focusing on particular sectors such as industrial work and the service and informal sectors where women are concentrated, and the globalization of industries so that work takes place in off-shore sites. We will view work in broader terms, however, interrogating the household division of domestic labor and how creating and maintaining kin relationships, social networks or communities is "work," typically done by women. We also explore various family structures, the needs of parents and partners, and the provision of social support from friends, "families we choose" or kin to cope with various social problems generated by paid employment. In this regard, we investigate how "communities" are formed at work sites based on the particular work culture or within communities derived from familial needs, and collective attempts to change conditions affecting work or families.
A second purpose of this course will be to understand the experiences of people of color in the United States, especially women. Whenever possible we will compare their experiences at work or within families with those of white workers and family members. We will be looking for common interests and ways in which differences in experiences lead to divisions within the work force, or perhaps interesting coalitions for social activism or the reimagination of work and family life.
We all are (or have been) members of families, and we all work in some capacity. Thus a third purpose is to develop a critical, self-reflective understanding of ourselves in relation to changing history of work and families. The premise is that we cannot be thoughtful social activists without understanding our own histories and the issues we grapple with in our participation in social change.
Required Texts:
Kathryn Edin and Laura Lein, Making Ends Meet: How Single Mothers Survive Welfare and Low-Wage Work. New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1997. Nancy A. Naples, ed. Community Activism and Feminist Politics: Organizing Across Race, Class, and Gender. New York: Routledge, 1998.
Holly Sklar, Chaos or Community? Seeking Solutions, Not Scapegoats For Bad Economics. Boston: South End Press, 1995.
Barrie Thorne and Marilyn Yalom, Rethinking the Family: Some Feminist Questions. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1992 (Revised edition).
Patricia Zavella, Women's Work and Chicano Families: Cannery Workers of the Santa Clara Valley. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987.
Texts will be available at The Literary Guillotine, 204 Locust St., Santa Cruz 457-1195.
A reader will be available at University Copy Service, 428 Front Street, 458-9600.
A file of newspaper and magazine articles will be place on reserve at McHenry for your optional reading.
Recommended texts (on reserve at McHenry Library):
Teresa L. Amott and Julie A. Matthaei, Race, Gender and Work: A Multicultural Economic History of Women in the United States. Boston: South End Press, 1991. Stephanie Coontz, The Way We Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap. New York: Basic Books, 1992.
Roger N. Lancaster and Micaela di Leonardo, ed., The Gender/Sexuality Reader: Culture, History, Political Economy. New York: Routledge, 1997
Judith Stacey, In the Name of the Family: Rethinking Family Values in the Postmodern Age. Boston: Beacon Press, 1996.
Ella Taylor, Prime-Time Families: Television Culture in Postwar America. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989.
Course Requirements:
1. Attendance and active participation in class discussion, including taking a turn at facilitating a discussion of the readings. Every class meeting students must turn in a list of discussion questions about each of the readings. Only excused absences, that is, documented medical or other emergencies, will be allowed.
2. A take-home midterm exam based on course readings. Distributed May 7, due May 14.
3. A take-home final exam, due June 11, the last day of class.
4. Research Paper: Students may conduct original research, either through library work, conducting oral histories, engaging in participant observation, administering a survey, or some combination thereof. Students must include some discussion of one of the readings and make reference to theory when analyzing or interpreting the data generated through the research project. Possible projects include: a history of a union organizing drive, an analysis of a particular community-based organization that attempts to bring abut social change related to race, gender, work or family, or an analysis of experiences of workers at a particular work site or sector. This would be a good opportunity to work on researching a possible field site or set of issues you want to investigate during your field study. Students who do research projects are encouraged to work collaboratively. Students must meet with the instructor to get approval for their projects, and a submit a prospectus and outline detailing their plans. A guide for writing papers will be distributed in class.
A Position Paper, discussing some important social problem that should be changed. Discuss in some detail the nature of the problem, and then how particular community-based or nongovernmental organizations have attempted to remedy the problem(s), or how such change should be organized.
Regardless of which type of paper you choose to write, you will be required to turn in a prospectus in which I approve your paper topic (due April 30), and an outline (due May 21). Final papers are due June 17, in my mailbox, College Eight Steno Pool, by 10 am.
A guide for conceptualizing and completing your paper will be handed out soon.
Course Schedule
April 7: Introduction to the course and each other; the relationship between theory and practice
April 9: The Relationship Between Productive and Reproductive Labor (work and family)
Patricia Zavella, "Preface," and "Two Worlds in One," pp. 1-29 in Women's Work and Chicano Families.
Vilma Ortíz, "Women of Color: A Demographic Overview," READER.
Nancy A. Naples, Introduction, pp. 1-27 in Community Activism & Feminist Politics.
April 14: The Great U-Turn in the Economy: Who Pays?
Reading: Holly Sklar, Chaos or Community, pp. 1-101
Recommended: Bennett Harrison and Barry Bluestone, The Great U-Turn: Corporate Restructuring and the Polarizing of America. New York : Basic Books, 1988
April 16: The Great U-Turn in the Economy (continued): What is to be Done?
Reading: Holly Sklar, Chaos or Community, pp. 103-178.
Recommended: Randy Albelda, Nancy Folbre & The Center for Popular Economics, The War on the Poor: A Defense Manual. New York: The New Press, 1996.
April 21: Theorizing Race, Gender, Class, and Family
Steven Gregory, "We've Been Down This Road Already," READER
Barrie Thorne, "Feminism and the Family," pp. 3-30 in Rethinking the Family.
Rayna Rapp, "Family and Class in Contemporary America," pp. 49-70 in Rethinking the Family.
April 23: Globalizing Production, Transforming Lives
Readings: Devon Peña, "The Mirror of Exploitation," READER.
Film: The Global Assemblyline
Recommended: Maria Patricia Fernandez Kelly, For We Are Sold: I and My People, Women and Industry on Mexico's Frontier. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1983.
Andrew Ross, ed. No Sweat: fashion free trade, and the rights of garment workers. New York: Verso, 1997.
April 28: Organizing on the Central Coast
Guest Speakers Sandy Brown, The Living Wage Coalition of Santa Cruz County
Sam Woodsmith, The Family Healthy Education Project
Willie McRae, The Second Harvest Food Bank
April 30: Deindustrialization in the "First World:" Race Matters
Maxine Baca Zinn, "Family, Race, and Poverty in the Eighties," pp. 71-90 in Rethinking the Family.
Recommended: Ellen Israel Rosen, Bitter Choices: Blue-Collar Women in and out of Work Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1987.
May 5: Gendered Work at Home
Patricia Hill Collins, "Black Women and Motherhood," pp. 215-245 in Rethinking the Family.
Judith Stacey, "Backward toward the Postmodern Family," pp. 91-118 in Rethinking the Family.
Thomas W. Lacquer, "The Facts of Fatherhood," pp. 155-175 in Rethinking the Family.
Recommended: Arlie Hochschild, with Anne Machung, The Second Shift: Working Parents and the Revolution at Home New York: Viking, 1989.
Readings: Micaela di Leonardo, "The Female Worlds of Cards and Holidays: Women, Families, and the Work of Kinship," pp. 246-261 in Rethinking the Family.
Kath Weston, "The Politics of Gay Families," pp. 119-139 in Rethinking the Family.
Verta Taylor and Leila J. Rupp, "Women's Culture and Lesbian Feminist Activism," pp. 57-79 in Community Activism and Feminist Politics.
May 12: Race, Gender and the World of Work
Denise A. Segura, "Chicanas in White Collar Jobs: You Have to Prove Yourself More."
Donald D. Stull, "Knock 'Em Dead: Work on the Killfloor of a Modern Beefpacking Plant."
Alex Stepick, et al., "The View from the Back of the House: Restaurants and Hotels in Miami."
Judith Goode, "Encounters over the Counter: Bosses, Workers, and Customers in a Changing Shopping Strip," all articles in the READER
Recommended: Mary Romero, Maid in the U.S.A. New York: Routledge, 1992.
Vicki Ruiz, ed. Las Obreras: The Politics of Work and Family, special issue of Aztlan, a Journal of Chicano Studies, vol. 20, nos. 1 & 2, Spring and Fall 1991.
May 14: Poverty, The Underworld, and Survival
Readings: Kathryn Edin and Laura Lein, Making Ends Meet, Chapters 1-4 (pp. 1-119).
Recommended: Linda Gordon, ed. Women, the State, and Welfare. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1990.
May 19: Poverty, The Underworld, and Survival (Continued)
Readings: Kathryn Edin and Laura Lein, Making Ends Meet, Chapters 5-8 (pp. 120-235)
Recommended; Jill Quadagno, The Color of Welfare: How Racism Undermined the War on Poverty. new York: Oxford University Press, 1994.
May 21: Transforming Politics
Celene Krauss, "Challenging Power: Toxic Waste Protests and the Politicization of White, Working Class Women," pp. 129-150 in Community Activism and Feminist Politics.
Karen Kendrick, "Producing the Battered Woman: Shelter Politics and the Power of the Feminist Voice," pp. 151-173 in Community Activism and Feminist Politics.
Lisa Sun-Hee Park, "Navigating the Anti-Immigrant Wave: The Korean Women's Hotline and the Politics of community," pp. 175-195 in Community Activism and Feminist Politics.
Recommended: Ann Bookman and Sandra Morgen, eds., Women and the Politics of Empowerment: Perspectives from the Workplace and the Community, Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1988.
May 26: Exchange Day--No Class
Readings: Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo, "Latina Immigrant Women and Paid Domestic Work: Upgrading the Occupation," pp. 199-211 in Community Activism and Feminist Politics.
Virginia Rinaldo Seitz, "Class, Gender, and Resistance in the Appalachian Coalfields," pp. 213-236 in Community Activism and Feminist Politics.
Carolyn Howe, "Gender, Race, and Community Activism: Competing Strategies in the Struggle for Public Education," pp. 237-254 in Community Activism and Feminist Politics.
Films: "City on the Edge" (12 min.) and "We're Local 11" (7 min.) produced by the H.E.R.E. Union Research Department
June 2: Constructing Community
Mary Pardo, "Creating Community: Mexican American Women in Eastside Los Angeles," pp. 275-300 in Community Activism and Feminist Politics.
Sharon Bays, "Work, Politics, and Coalition Building: Hmong Women's Activism in a Central California Town," pp. 301-325 in Community Activism and Feminist Politics.
Nancy A. Naples, "Women's Community Activism: Exploring the Dynamics of Politicization and Diversity," pp. 327-349 in Community Activism and Feminist Politics.
Recommended; William V. Flores and Rina Benmayor, Latino Cultural Citizenship: Claiming Identity, Space, and Rights. Boston: Beacon Press, 1997.
June 4: Globalization of Food Processing: Work, Family & Community Activism in Watsonville
Reading: Douglas Massey, "March of Folly: U.S. Immigration Policy After NAFTA," READER William V. Flores, "Mujeres en Huelga: Cultural Citizenship and Gender Empowerment in a Cannery Strike," READER.
Film: Watsonville on Strike
Recommended: Paule Cruz Takash, A Crisis of Democracy: Community Responses to the Latinization of a California Town Dependent on Immigrant Labor. Dissertation, Anthropology Department, University of California, Berkeley, 1990.
June 9: Globalization of Food Processing: Work, Family & Community Activism in Irapuato
Readings: Ana María Alonso, "Work and Gusto: Gender and Re-creation in a North Mexican Pueblo," READER Patricia Zavella, "Engendering Transnationalism, Transforming Lives: Food Processing in California and Mexico," READER.
Slide Show: Food Processing in Irapuato
Recommended: Judith Adler Hellman, Mexican Lives . New York: The New Press, 1994.
June 11: Conclusion, check ins, and course evaluation. Finals due.