Mexican And Mexican American Agricultural Labor In The United States

Perhaps no other industrial technology changed the course of Mexican history in the United States--and Mexico--than did the coming of the railroads. Tens of thousands of Mexicans worked for the railroads in the United States, especially in the Southwest and Midwest. Construction crews soon became railroad workers proper, along with maintenance crews later. Extensive Mexican American settlements appeared throughout the lower and upper Midwest as the result of the railroad. The substantial Mexican American populations in these regions today are largely attributable to 19th- and 20th-century railroad work. Only agricultural work surpassed railroad work in terms of employment of Mexicans. The full history of Mexican American railroad labor and settlement in the United States had not been told, however, until Jeffrey Marcos Garcílazo's groundbreaking research in Traqueros. Garcílazo mined numerous archives and other sources to provide the first and only comprehensive history of Mexican railroad workers across the United States, with particular attention to the Midwest. He first explores the origins and process of Mexican labor recruitment and immigration and then describes the areas of work performed. He reconstructs the workers' daily lives and explores not only what the workers did on the job but also what they did at home and how they accommodated and/or resisted Americanization. Boxcar communities, strike organizations, and "traquero culture" finally receive historical acknowledgment. Integral to his study is the importance of family settlement in shaping working class communities and consciousness throughout the Midwest.

Earlier in this century, over one million Mexican immigrants moved to the United States, attracted by the prospect of work in California's fields. The Mexican farmworkers were tolerated by Americans as long as there was enough work to go around. During the Great Depression, though, white Americans demanded that Mexican workers and their families return to Mexico. In the 1930s, the federal government and county relief agencies forced the repatriation of half a million Mexicans--and some Mexican Americans as well. Camille Guerin-Gonzales tells the story of their migration, their years here, and of the repatriation program--one of the largest mass removal operations ever sanctioned by the U.S. government. She exposes the powers arrayed against Mexicans as well as the patterns of Mexican resistance, and she maps out constructions of national and ethnic identity across the contested terrain of the American Dream.

Monograph comprising a collection of readings on issues related to Mexican migrant worker flows (including irregular migrants) to the USA - presents historical and political aspects of foreign worker employment, and discusses forced return migration of Mexican nationals during the 1930's, the impact of legal border commuting frontier workers as well as Mexico's reaction to USA migration policy measures against illegal Mexican workers, etc. Bibliography pp. 285 to 289, references and statistical tables.

Report on the employment of Mexican migrant workers and seasonal workers in agriculture in the USA from 1900 to 1960 - comments on relevant legislation of the USA and Mexico, discusses American labour demand and agricultural policy, and examines the economic implications for Mexico of emigration, the bracero programme, etc. Bibliography pp. 144 to 152, map, references and statistical tables.

Based on in-depth interviews and extensive observations in the counties of Glenn, Solano, Napa, and Contra Costa in Northern California, this volume explores the daily lives and problems of Mexican and Mexican-American agricultural workers in their respective communities. The author draws on his discussion with community leaders, his participation in community organization meetings, and his volunteer work in community programs to present an overall picture of this unique farm-worker society and the ways in which individuals adapt to it.