With These Hands: The Hidden World of Migrant Farmworkers Today [Paperback]

Daniel Rothenberg (Author), Robert Coles (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 2, 2000 | ISBN-10: 0520227344 | ISBN-13: 978-0520227347 | Edition: 1

With These Hands documents the farm labor system through the presentation of a collection of voices--workers who labor in the fields, growers who manage the multi-billion dollar agricultural industry, contractors who link workers with growers, coyotes who smuggle people across the border, union organizers, lobbyists, physicians, workers' families in Mexico, farmworker children and others. The diversity of stories presents the world of migrant farmworkers as a complex social and economic system, a network of intertwined lives, showing how all Americans are bound to the struggles and contributions of our nation's farm laborers.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

More than 30 years after activists like Cesar Chavez called attention to conditions in California's fields, this remarkable study shows that the grinding poverty and abuse suffered by America's most vulnerable workers remains a national disgrace. Anthropologist Rothenberg, a former outreach worker and paralegal representing farmworkers, has weighed in with an epic account culled from more than 250 interviews conducted throughout the United States and Mexico. Here are cameo portraits of illegal immigrants, political refugees, "fruit tramps," drug addicts held in debt peonage at Southern labor camps ("Everybody knew about the labor camp. The sheriff, the farmers, and the crewleader were all in cahoots," recounts one cocaine user), growers, contractors, human smugglers or "coyotes," migrant children, all of them speaking in their own words. Rothenberg includes unidentified photos, one of the few lapses in a richly textured documentary that evokes both pity and terror, as when the daughter of a single migrant woman in Florida describes how her mother's boyfriend once sexually abused her and how her mother took violent revenge. Rothenberg's book is clearly an indictment of a farm labor system that, he writes, allows large companies to distance themselves from workers. And those workers, despite changes of the 1960s, continue to struggle against abuses, poor pay and a "special status" that seems increasingly entrenched.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Last year's The Fight in the Fields, Susan Fertiss and Ricardo Sandoval's impressive biography of Cesar Chavez, stirred renewed interest in the plight of farmworkers and their movement. Despite Chavez's success at organizing workers nearly 30 years ago, farmworkers' wages have fallen 20 percent or more (accounting for inflation) over the last two decades, and their situation is perhaps worse than ever. Rothenberg is an anthropologist who was an outreach worker and advocate for a federally funded legal services program that represented farmworkers. There he was struck by the eloquence and dignity of the people he met. Determined to document their world, he left his job and began collecting the stories of individual workers. He realized that to paint a complete picture, he also needed to talk to contractors, growers, lobbyists, organizers, coyotes, and others. In all, Rothenberg gathered more than 250 interviews. His goal is to show that farmworkers are "people like the rest of us," and by doing so, make more real the tragedy of their hardships. David Rouse --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: University of California Press; 1 edition (October 2, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0520227344
• ISBN-13: 978-0520227347
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.8 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #620,614 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Everyone who eats should read this book., January 22, 1999

By 

Sharon Fratepietro "sharoninsc" (Charleston, SC United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

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This review is from: With These Hands: The Hidden World of Migrant Farmworkers Today (Hardcover)

"The Poorest of the Invisible Working Poor" could be an alternate title for Daniel Rothenberg's "With These Hands." Most of us know migrant farm workers only when one of them breaks the law and get written up in the newspaper. However, just about every piece of produce we routinely select at the supermarket has passed through their hands. I particularly liked the format of Rothenberg's book, alternating factual explanation with monologues by those involved in farm labor. I appreciated the wide variety of viewpoints exposed, not just those of migrant workers, but also of contractors, farmer employers, government officials and labor organizers. Most migrant farmworkers are Hispanic, many of them in this country legally, and some are U.S. citizens from years back. Many others, out of economic desperation, risk their lives sneaking across the U.S./Mexican border to find honest work doing the most backbreaking labor, under the most inhumane living conditions, for the most miserable wages. Their sheer numbers help keep farmworker wages low, but the power of the agricultural lobby has helped maintain the dismal conditions of farm labor since the Depression. Everyone who eats should read this book. Every politician should read it twice.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Positve depiction on the contents of the book., May 5, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: With These Hands: The Hidden World of Migrant Farmworkers Today (Hardcover)

Read This Book! The book With These Hands, is a very accurate depiction of migrant farmworks today. The author, Daniel Rothenberg, is an anthropologist that spent three years living among workers and getting to know the people who work in the labor camps. He compiled more than 250 interviews to try and gain insight on the numerous hardships that these people face. Many people only hear about migrant workers who get into run-ins with the law, therefore giving these people a stereotypical view of how many of these migrants actually are, and what they go through to make such horrible wages. Every aspect of these farmworkers lives are explored, from wages to the farm labor market to consequences of labor practices. This book is really a reality check to people because of how much these workers have an affect on our lives. People don't stop to think about how all of their fruit products are gathered and how the workers are treated for doing such back breaking work. This book differs from many others that have been written on this same topic because it covers all different angles of migrant farmwork for yesterday and today. A definite two thumbs up!

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is a fine, very readable book about migrant farmworkers, April 30, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: With These Hands: The Hidden World of Migrant Farmworkers Today (Hardcover)

With These Hands is an excellent book that contains oral histories -- astonishing interviews -- with farmworkers, growers, labor contractors, government officials and labor union officials. These statements are interspersed with excellent but brief summaries of various issues. The full range of the complexity of farmworkers' lives is explored, from wages and benefits to the structure of the farm labor market to the international consequences of agricultural labor practices. As a lawyer for migrant farmworkers, I'm all for books about them but have been disappointed by a lot of what has been written. This book does not disappoint.