Labor history (discipline) 1

Labor history (discipline)

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Labor history (or labour history) is a broad field of study concerned with the development of the labor movementand the working class. The central concerns of labor historians include the development of labor unions, strikes,lockouts and protest movements, industrial relations, and the progress of working class and socialist political parties,as well as the social and cultural development of working people. Labor historians may also concern themselves withissues of gender, race, ethnicity and other factors besides class.Labor history developed in tandem with the growth of a self-conscious working-class political movement in manyWestern countries in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Whilst early labor historians were drawn to protestmovements such as Luddism and Chartism, the focus of labor history was often on institutions: chiefly the laborunions and political parties. Exponents of this institutional approach included Sidney and Beatrice Webb. The workof the Webbs, and other pioneers of the discipline, was marked by optimism about the capacity of the labormovement to effect fundamental social change and a tendency to see its development as a process of steady,inevitable and unstoppable progress. As two contemporary labor historians have noted, early work in the field was"designed to service and celebrate the Labour movement."[1]

In the 1950s and 1960s, labor history was redefined and expanded in focus by a number of historians, amongstwhom the most prominent and influential figures were E. P. Thompson and Eric Hobsbawm. Thompson andHobsbawm were both Marxists and were critical of the existing labor movement. They were concerned to approachhistory "from below" and to explore the agency and activity of working people at the workplace, in protestmovements and in social and cultural activities. Thompson's seminal study The Making of the English WorkingClass[2] was particularly influential in setting a new agenda for labor historians and locating the importance of thestudy of labor for social history in general. Also in the 1950s and 1960s, historians began to give serious attention togroups who had previously been largely neglected, such as women and non-caucasian ethnic groups. Some historianssituated their studies of gender and race within a class analysis: for example, C. L. R. James, a Marxist who wroteabout the struggles of blacks in the Haitian Revolution. Others questioned whether class was a more important socialcategory than gender or race and pointed to racism, patriarchy and other examples of division and oppression withinthe working class.Labor history remains centered on two fundamental sets of interest: institutional histories of workers' organizations,and the "history from below" approach of the Marxist historians.Despite the influence of the Marxists, many labor historians rejected the revolutionary implications implicit in thework of Thompson, Hobsbawm et al. In the 1980s, the importance of class itself, as an historical social relationshipand explanatory concept, began to be widely challenged. Some notable labor historians turned from Marxism toembrace a postmodernist approach, emphasizing the importance of language and questioning whether classes couldbe so considered if they did not use a "language of class". Other historians emphasized the weaknesses andmoderation of the historic labor movement, arguing that social development had been characterized more byaccommodation, acceptance of the social order and cross-class collaboration than by conflict and dramatic change.

Labor history (discipline) 2

Kirk (2010) surveys labor historiography in Britain since the formation of the Society for the Study of LabourHistory in 1960. He reports that labor history has been mostly pragmatic, eclectic and empirical; it has played animportant role in historiographical debates, such as those revolving around history from below, institutionalismversus the social history of labor, class, populism, gender, language, postmodernism and the turn to politics. Kirkrejects suggestions that the field is declining, and stresses its innovation, modification and renewal. Kirk also detectsa move into conservative insularity and academicism. He recommends a more extensive and critical engagementwith the kinds of comparative, transnational and global concerns increasingly popular among labor historianselsewhere, and calls for a revival of public and political interest in the topics.[3] Meanwhile Navickas, (2011)examines recent scholarship including the histories of collective action, environment and human ecology, and genderissues, with a focus on work by James Epstein, Malcolm Chase, and Peter Jones.[4]

Prominent labor historians EP Thompson Rajnarayan Chandravarkar Chitra Joshi Sabyasachi Bhattacharya Prabhu Mohapatra Marcel Van der Linden Dipesh Chakrabarty

Notes[1] Mike Savage and Andrew Miles, The Remaking of the British Working Class, 1840-1940, Routledge, 1994, p. 1. ISBN 0-415-07320-0[2] E.P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class, Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1963. ISBN 0-14-013603-7[3] Neville Kirk, "Challenge, Crisis, and Renewal? Themes in the Labour History of Britain, 19602010," Labour History Review, Aug 2010,

Vol. 75 Issue 2, pp 162-180[4] Katrina Navickas, "What happened to class? New histories of labour and collective action in Britain," Social History, May 2011, Vol. 36

Issue 2, pp 192-204

Further reading Allen, Joan, Alan Campbell, Eric Hobsbawm and John McIlroy. Histories of Labour: National and International

Perspectives (2010) Arnesen, Eric. Encyclopedia of U.S. Labor and Working-Class History (3 Vol 2006) Kirk, Neville. "Challenge, Crisis, and Renewal? Themes in the Labour History of Britain, 19602010," Labour

History Review, Aug 2010, Vol. 75 Issue 2, pp 162-180 Linden, Marcel van der. Transnational Labour History: Explorations (2003) * Navickas, Katrina. "What

happened to class? New histories of labour and collective action in Britain," Social History, May 2011, Vol. 36Issue 2, pp 192-204

Price, Richard. "Histories of Labour and Labour History," Labour History Review, Dec 2010, Vol. 75 Issue 3, pp263-270, on Britain

Robert, Jean-Louis, Antoine Prost and Chris Wrigley, eds. The Emergence of European Trade Unionism (2004) Walkowitz, Daniel J., and Donna T. Haverty-Stacke, eds. Rethinking U.S. Labor History: Essays on the

Working-Class Experience, 1756-2009 (2010)

Article Sources and Contributors 3

Article Sources and ContributorsLabor history (discipline) Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=543559600 Contributors: AdamRetchless, AlbertW, Altenmann, AnakngAraw, Bkwillwm, Bobo192,Bookandcoffee, Cgingold, CsDix, Dogru144, El C, Fifelfoo, Hmains, IOH, Imaginenitin, Jibbajabba, Jusdafax, Lectonar, Mark83, Mattley, Maximus Rex, Moulder, Mydogategodshat, Noisy,Pm356, RayneVanDunem, Rich Farmbrough, Richard Myers, Rjensen, Sam Hocevar, Some standardized rigour, SpNeo, Stevertigo, Stevietheman, Tim1965, Tirin, Varano, Wasted Time R, 39anonymous edits

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Labor history (discipline)Prominent labor historians Notes Further reading

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