Category Archives: Issues

Valuing Working-Class Life: Recent Memoirs by Working-Class Women

Posted on December 9, 2019 by

With the UK general election looming, there has been renewed interest in the effects of years of austerity measures on poor and working-class people. It seems clear that inequality has increased and more and more people rely on food banks … Continue reading →

Posted in Class and the Media, Contributors, Issues, Sarah Attfield, Working-Class Culture | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Amplified Advantage: Why Education Is Not the Answer to Our Class Problems

Posted on December 2, 2019 by

Thirty years ago, after having dropped out of college after just one term, unable to pay for my dorm room, I was unsure if I would ever leave the working class.  Two years later I was a student at Barnard … Continue reading →

Posted in Allison L. Hurst, Class and Education, Contributors, Issues | Tagged , , | 4 Comments

Re-Placing Class: Community, Politics, Work, and Labor in a Changing World

Posted on November 25, 2019 by

This week, we’re posting something a little different: the call for papers for this year’s Working-Class Studies Association conference. This year’s gathering marks the 25th anniversary of the conference that led to the founding of the Center for Working-Class Studies, … Continue reading →

Posted in Issues, Understanding Class, Youngstown | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

National Labor Relations Board Twists the Knife in the Heart of Unions and Workers

Posted on November 18, 2019 by

It may be hard to remember, but the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is supposed to ensure the right of workers to organize and safeguard the stated public policy expounded in the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), which favors collective … Continue reading →

Posted in Contributors, Issues, Labor and Community Activism, Wade Rathke | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Sanders or Warren? Populist-Progressivism or New Deal? Take Your Pick!

Posted on November 11, 2019 by

Despite their general agreement on specific issues, the two most left-wing candidates for the 2020 Democratic Party nomination, Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, have embraced different ideological markers.  Sanders calls himself a “democratic socialist” and his near-miss 2016 primary … Continue reading →

Posted in Contributors, Guest Bloggers, Issues, Working-Class Politics | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments

Counting on Class: The Continuing Appeal of Meritocracy

Posted on November 4, 2019 by

Neither faith in nor critiques of the idea of meritocracy is new. Michael Young’s famous 1958 book The Rise of Meritocracy argued that class privilege and advantage were likely to be amplified as financial and cultural capital passed across generations … Continue reading →

Posted in Contributors, Issues, Tim Strangleman, Understanding Class | Tagged , | 2 Comments

En Guerre: Populism and a Plant Closing in France

Posted on October 28, 2019 by

Stéphane Brizé’s En Guerre (At War), released in France in 2018 and in the United States this July, tells the story a car factory closing in Agen, a small company town in the southwest of France.  In this grim and … Continue reading →

Posted in Class and the Media, Contributors, Guest Bloggers, Issues, Labor and Community Activism, The Working Class and the Economy | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment