A History of American Working-Class Literature

Description

A History of American Working-Class Literature sheds light not only on the lived experience of class but the enormously varied creativity of working-class people throughout the history of what is now the United States. By charting a chronology of working-class experience, as the conditions of work have changed over time, this volume shows how the practice of organizing, economic competition, place, and time shape opportunity and desire. The subjects range from transportation narratives and slave songs to the literature of deindustrialization and globalization. Among the literary forms discussed are memoir, journalism, film, drama, poetry, speeches, fiction, and song. Essays focus on plantation, prison, factory, and farm, as well as on labor unions, workers' theaters, and innovative publishing ventures. Chapters spotlight the intersections of class with race, gender, and place. The variety, depth, and many provocations of this History are certain to enrich the study and teaching of American literature.

Nicholas Coles is Associate Professor of English at the University of Pittsburgh, where he teaches and writes about literacy and pedagogy, working-class literature, detective fiction, and climate change. He is co-editor of Working Classics: Poems on Industrial Life (with Peter Oresick, 1990), For a Living: The Poetry of Work (with Peter Oresick, 1995), and American Working-Class Literature: An Anthology (with Janet Zandy, 2007). A former president of the Working-Class Studies Association, Coles is a regular writer on Working-Class Perspectives. Paul Lauter was Smith Professor of Literature at Trinity College, Connecticut until his retirement. He is general editor of the ground-breaking Heath Anthology of American Literature (2005). Recent books include From Walden Pond to Jurassic Park (2001) and Literature, Class and Culture (with Ann Fitzgerald, 2000). Active in civil rights, feminist, peace, and labor movements, Lauter worked for social cause organizations, including the American Friends Service Committee, was a founder of The Feminist Press, served as union official at the State University of New York, and co-authored a book about the 1960s, The Conspiracy of the Young (with Florence Howe, 1970). He was also president of the American Studies Association.

'Coles (Univ. of Pittsburgh) and Lauter (ret., Trinity College) bring together essays that challenge the notion of the 'American dream'. The essays contextualize the experience of the working class in the US and consider its representation in literature. ... this collection appears at a time of extreme class inequality in the the US. To write about working class literature is a political act because it carries writers and readers beyond the text and into the realities of working-class lives. ... Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.' S. L. Rottschafer, CHOICE