The Human Cost of Food: Farmworkers' Lives, Labor, and Advocacy

Contents

Contents List of Abbreviations ix Preface xiii Acknowledgments xvii Lucas Benitez Sowing Seeds for Change symposium address 1 Charles D. Thompson, Jr. Introduction 2 Wendy Daniels Ibarra The Virgin of Guadalupe, interview of Carmen Tomás 21 Alejandra Okie Holt and CHAPTER 1. Making Home: Culture, Ethnicity, Sister Evelyn Mattern and Religion among Farmworkers in the Southeastern United States 22 Lucas Benitez Sowing Seeds for Change symposium address 53 Charles D. Thompson, Jr. CHAPTER 2. Layers of Loss: Migrants, Small Farmers, and Agribusiness 55 Rachel LaCour Niesen Life on Easy Street 87 Cindy Hahamovitch CHAPTER 3. Standing Idly By: ‘‘Organized’’ Farmworkers in South Florida during the Depression and World War II 89 Joe Bagby Rifaré mi suerte/I’ll Raffle My Luck, interview of Humberto Zapata Alvizo 111 Garry G. Geffert CHAPTER 4. H-2A Guestworker Program: A Legacy of Importing Agricultural Labor 113 Roman Rodriguez Testimony at Hearing before the Commission on Agricultural Workers 137 Greg Schell CHAPTER 5. Farmworker Exceptionalism under the Law: How the Legal System Contributes to Farmworker Poverty and Powerlessness 139 viii The Human Cost of Food Rachel Avery Wells Farms 167 Kris Adams The Conditions at the Camp Are Not Great, interview of Vanessa 168 Christopher Holden CHAPTER 6. Bitter Harvest: Housing Conditions of Migrant and Seasonal Farmworkers 169 Jenny Carroll The History We Wrote This Summer 195 Colin Austin CHAPTER 7. The Struggle for Health in Times of Plenty 198 Marcella Hurtado Gomez That Summer 219 Gloria Velasquez Bella Juventud/Wonderful Youth 220 Ramiro Arceo, Joy CHAPTER 8. Understanding the Challenges Kusserow, and Al Wright and Potential of Migrant Students 222 Melinda Steele I Don’t Think People Give Up, interview of Sheila Payne 247 Paul Ortiz CHAPTER 9. From Slavery to Cesar Chavez and Beyond: Farmworker Organizing in the United States 249 Lucas Benitez Sowing Seeds for Change symposium address 277 Melinda F. Wiggins CONCLUSION. An Invocation to Act 278 APPENDIX I. Developing a Syllabus on Farmworker Advocacy 299 APPENDIX II. Farmworker-Related Organizations and Agencies 307 APPENDIX III. Recommended Readings 313 Works Cited 317 Contributors 331 Index 333 ...