Not a “Sack of Potatoes”
Why Labor Historians Need to Take Agriculture Seriously
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 11211697 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Cindy Hahamovitch (William & Mary, corresponding author), Rick Halpern (0000-0002-0251-1678, University of Toronto) |
| Year | 2004 |
| Volume | 65 |
| Pages | 3-10 |
| Publication date | 2004-04-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | International Labor and Working-Class History (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0147-5479 • E-ISSN: 1471-6445 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1017/s014754790400002x |
| OpenAlex | W1985550834 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 4 |
Labor and working class historians, whether explicitly Marxist or not, have tended to use models of class and class formation that privilege urban industrial workers, depicting their lived experience as, somehow, hermetically sealed off from the countryside. Despite an awareness of the intertwined and overlapping nature of rural and urban economies, most historians have treated rural workers as either peasants or slaves, and therefore fitting subjects for separate fields of historical inquiry, or as individuals on the cusp of proletarianization, would-be or about-to-be industrial workers. Indeed, even studies focused on recent history have viewed the rural sector as a “backward” one and constructed the industrial setting as “modern.” Thus, even if few labor historians have dismissed agricultural workers with the condescension of Marx's “sack of potatoes,” as a collectivity we have paid them insufficient attention and our field is weaker as a result
Agriculture · Archaeology · Class (philosophy · Economics · Epistemology · Labour economics · Marxist philosophy · Political science · Privilege (computing · Proletarianization · Proletariat · Sack · Sociology · Working class · American History and Culture · Engineering · History · Law
| Unique citing works | 4 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,21 |
| Citation span | 2007 - 2025 (19) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 4 |