Work, Labor, and Power

Catalog description

This seminar is an examination of changing attitudes toward work and labor, and it is designed to give students an overview of labor history and the sociology of work. The course covers patterns of agrarian, industrial, and post-industrial production, gendered and racialized segmentation of labor, and the record of worker organization. Its historical scope runs from colonial/Indigenous agriculture to the digital labor landscape of today, and the overarching framework is one in which work is utilized as a medium of power (and counter-power) in society. Primary readings are the central learning material, but students are encouraged to make connections to real life events and experiences in today’s world of work.