Labor Studies

Examines the situation of women coal miners in the U.S., their struggle to be hired, their day-to-day lives in the mines, the economic necessity that first made them seek work as miners, and the opposition they face from their families, the community and their male coworkers.

This documentary examines the situation of Dominican immigration into New York City, detailing the economic pressures of unemployment and poverty in the Dominican Republic which have led to a rapidly growing Dominican community in New York, primarily in Brooklyn and the Washington Heights area of Upper Manhattan.

Examines the plight of a Kentucky tobacco farmer and his family in the face of uncertain government price support programs and a growing national antismoking campaign.

This expose of the plight of undocumented Mexican workers in the U.S. also provides a comprehensive overview of the complex issue of Mexican immigration, including interviews with prominent scholars, attorneys and organizers.

Particularly recommended as a teaching tool regarding issues of Latino Studies, Chicano Studies, Immigration, and Cultural Studies.

Examines the closing of three major steel plants in Youngstown, Ohio, between 1976 and 1980, showing the social and human costs of this tragedy through interviews with steelworkers, their families and friends, labor attorneys, local union leaders and community activists.

This video offers an in-depth historical examination of Connecticut's Naugatuck Valley brass industry, from its heyday to its present decline. From the mid-19th century to its peak during WWI, 'Brass Valley' produced more than half of America's brass goods, from buttons and belt buckles to auto parts, pistols and cannon shells.

This video portrays the work of men who continue to earn a living by harvesting shellfish from Long Island Bay, near New York City, and selling them to local markets.

This video examines the world of New York City's hot-dog vendors, revealing their lifestyles, hopes and dreams, and the political struggle in which New York's Mayor Rudy Giuliani is attempting to restrict their access to the city's streets. It features interviews with a wide variety of vendors, and members of the city's Vendor Review Panel and Business Improvement District.

This film by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Nigel Noble documents the workaday lives of Brazilian peasants who cut down trees in the Amazon rain forest and burn the wood in earthen kilns to make charcoal, an essential ingredient for the manufacture of pig iron in the U.S

A dramatic portrait of immigrant life in the U.S. as seen through the eyes of the sweatshop workers who made up the Jewish anarchist movement.

During the Great Depression, 120 families of Jewish garment workers from New York City moved to the New Jersey countryside to develop a government-sponsored, agro- industrial cooperative community. This film tells the story of the cooperative community through archival footage, photos and interviews with original homesteaders and their children.

Tells the story of the anti-Nazi and rescue activities of the American Jewish labor movement, including their aid to the Underground fighters of the ghettoes of East Europe, and their assistance to Holocaust survivors in refugee camps across the globe. The video features rare archival footage and photos, plus interviews with labor veterans, Holocaust survivors and scholars.

Tells the story of Joe Hill (1879-1915), a Swedish immigrant to America who became a songwriter, cartoonist and labor organizer for the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and whose 1915 execution by the state of Utah for a crime he probably did not commit transformed him into a martyr for the labor movement and an international folk hero.

From the first concept to the final rivet, The Statue of Liberty was the creation of volunteers. Strange to say, no government was involved. This documentary tells the exciting story of who was involved: hundreds of thousands of ordinary citizens from all walks of life, even children, gave their small earnings to realize Miss Liberty, first in France and then in the U.S. It took 14 years to consummate.

Part of the Who Built America? series, this video tells the vivid tale of the African-American exodus from the rural South to northern industrial cities during World War I.

This video looks at a nationwide rebellion that brought the U.S. to a standstill, when 80,000 railroad workers went out on strike to protest the excesses of the railroad companies.

This video features a fugitive woman slave describing life, work, and day-to-day resistance to slavery on a North Carolina cotton plantation during the 1840s and 1850s.

This video is based on the life of Boston shoemaker George Robert Twelves and reveals how working people helped make the American Revolution.

This video is a film-noir spoof, private eye Clio Malarkey investigates the central role played by working Americans in U.S. history and the hazards of misinterpreting the past.

Features the musical traditions and verbal recollections of eight retired African-American railroad track laborers, whose occupational folk songs were once heard along the railroad lines that crisscross the South.