Less than sixty years ago, the plight of the country’s most vulnerable migrant farm workers shocked millions of Americans after many of whom had just enjoyed their biggest meal of the year. Since it first aired after Thanksgiving Day in 1960, “Harvest of Shame” has become one of the seminal documentaries in the history of American broadcast journalism. Not only was it a significant contribution to the anti-poverty movement in the 1960s, it also exposed the plight of migrant workers in American and their brutal living conditions in which leading journalist Edward R. Murrow described as “wrong the dignity of man” (Harvest of Shame). The shocking and continuous parallels between the film and John Steinbeck’s “The Harvest Gypsies” reflect the …show more content…
inaction from the government and general populace between the 1930s and 1960s. As an urgent lamentation for legislative and public action, the film was integral in promoting legislative action and shaping public perception towards migrant workers in the 1960s. Drawing upon rich photographs and poignant narration, Murrow manifested a compelling and in-depth instrument of communication that reflected the desperate plight of migrant farm laborers and galvanized public opinion and perception in hopes of spurring a movement for institutional change. Not only did the film feature the honest depiction of dire working conditions, it also highlights the absence of change that continued to force the “men, women and children who harvested crops for the best-fed nation on earth” to squander their lives in inhuman conditions (Harvest of Shame). Described by Murrow as "the forgotten people; the under-educated; the under-fed”, migrant farm laborers and their children suffered from brutal living conditions that drove them into despair (Harvest of Shame). One of the most important scenes depicts 9-year-old Jerome King tending his three younger sisters as his mother and older siblings worked in the fields (Harvest of Shame). In the family’s home, a one-room shack, there were countless flies that swarmed around an old pot of beans and a ripped up mattress in which Jerome described as being infested by “rats” (Harvest of Shame). Not only does the haunting images depicted in the film mirror the stories in Steinbeck’s 1936 articles, it also highlights the lack of social and legislative progress in improving the lives of American farm laborers. Much like the Kings in 1960, the family in Steinbeck’s article survived on “one bed” where “they had one quilt and a piece of canvas for bedding” and there was only room for the children if the “mother and father sleep with their legs spread wide” (Steinbeck 27). This continuation of poor living conditions for migrant laborers is not only appalling but also shocking. Furthermore, these stories and images parallel the experiences of urban immigrant workers in the early 1900s where families often “lived in one room” and “smallpox ran through the city” (Dubofsky & McCartin 111). While urban immigrants gained significant reform through unionizations and government legislation, migrant farm laborers were stuck as evident by the lack of change. Between the 1930s and 1960s, there was virtually no progress in improving the lives of migrant farm laborers as depicted from the horrifying images in both the “Harvest of Shame” and “The Harvest Gypsies”. “Harvest of Shame” also exposed the alarming consequences associated with unsanitary and poor living condition that resulted from a lack of action to benefit migrant workers. As Steinbeck wrote this article in 1936, he details how the migrants' chronic state of malnutrition that makes them vulnerable to diseases. “He has the swollen belly caused by malnutrition. The first year he had a little milk, but he has had none since. He will die in a very short time” (Steinbeck 30). His grim account of the young child reflects the reality surrounding many children living in Hoovervilles. Looking at “Harvest of Shame” and thirty years into the future, it is alarming that children of farm laborers still suffer from poor hygiene and widespread malnutrition. In Murrow’s interview with Mrs. Dobey, she explains that she can only afford to give her daughter “milk once a week” (Harvest of Shame). Furthermore, when Murrow asked Jerome if he would feed his sisters that day, he replied with a shrug and said, “I don’t know, sir” (Harvest of Shame). These forceful images and narrations exposes the lingering inaction by the government and the public that has persisted for almost thirty years and continues to trap migrant workers and their families in the lowest rungs of society. Not only does “Harvest of Shame” and “The Harvest Gypsies” expose the striking similarities in the living condition and desperate poverty amongst migrant farm workers between the 1930s and 1960s, they also highlight the inaction of the government and general public to curb the callous greed of growers and employers. “The migrants are needed, and they are hated…the unique nature of California agriculture requires that these migrants exist, and requires that they move about” (Steinbeck 20). The hypocritical and contemptible attitude of growers towards migrant workers in Steinbeck’s articles remains unchanged in Murrow’s documentary. “They are not worried about you…they want you out as soon as possible…the only time you are welcomed is when they need you” (Harvest of Shame). As described by the farm laborer, growers utilize and marginalize migrant labor to their advantage. After reaping the benefits of their work, growers immediately cast them aside. The similarities between the tactics employed by growers in the 1930s and those in the film further exemplify the general absence of progress in improving the lives of migrant laborers. While the articles in “The Harvest Gypsies” help highlight the similarities and lack of progress for migrant farm workers between the 1930s and 1960s, “Harvest of Shame” and its stories of African-American migrant laborers further reflects the changing times with the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s.
The film opens with a crowd of African-Americans looking for jobs (Harvest of Shame). As employers yell out the daily wage, men and women are tightly packed onto large trucks headed to the fields (Harvest of Shame). One farmer describes the scene, “we used to own our slaves…now we just rent them” (Harvest of Shame). This shows that even though slavery has been abolished, unfair treatment towards African-American workers still exist. Even though African-American workers existed in the 1930s, they were generally excluded in Steinbeck’s article. Their heavy presence in the film not only highlights the continued mistreatment of migrant farm laborers, especially African-Americans, but also how the Civil Rights Movement was “a black freedom movement’s fight for jobs and justices” (MacLean 4). As evident through the film, African-Americans were consistently suppressed by employers which contributed to igniting the fire for “economic citizenship” during the Civil Rights Movement (Martínez-Matsuda 10 November …show more content…
2015). Not only did the film ignite a strong sense of indignation towards the plight of farm workers, it also helped arouse wide public interests and support.
By showing it after Thanksgiving Day, the film startled and astonished many of its viewers as the images of dirty shacks and hungry children did not square with the large feast of Thanksgiving. “Were it not for the labor of the people you are going to meet, you might not starve, but your table would not be laden with the luxuries that we have all come to regard as essentials” (Harvest of Shame). Furthermore, the film did contribute to the wave of social awareness and activism in the 1960s. Public outcry helped propel the plight of farm laborers on to the nation’s political agenda. In 1962, Congress passed the Migrant Health Act which financed clinics, immunization, and prenatal and natal care (Knebel 1132). However, real progress was elusive as many agricultural businesses launched an offensive to block further attempts at reforms and wage increases by lobbying lawmakers (Knebel 1132). While Murrow and the film had limited legislative impact, it galvanized public opinion and ignited a movement towards helping migrant
workers. With its raw and striking images, “Harvest of Shame” is an unflinching examination of the desperate plight of migrant farm laborers. Not only is the film an example of the lack of progress in improving the lives of migrant workers, it is critical in shaping public perception and opinions in the 1960s. Murrow’s film, “Harvest of Shame” is one of the most important documentaries in the United States labor and working-class history as it traces the plight of migrant workers and ignites public interests in helping to improve the lives of those that “harvest crops for the best-fed nation on earth” (Harvest of Shame).
At the turn of the Twentieth Century America is one generation removed from the civil war. For African Americans times are supposed to be improving following the Reconstruction of the south and the ratification of the 15th amendment. Except, in actuality life is still extremely tough for the vast majority of African Americans. Simultaneously, the birthing of the industrial revolution is taking place in America and a clear social divide in daily livelihood and economic prosperity is forming across the country. This time is known as the Gilded Age because as the metaphor emphasizes, only a thin layer of wealth and prosperity of America’s elite robber barons is masking the immense amount of impoverished American laborers. Among the vast majority
After the black Americans were freed from their slave masters they did not have ‘a cent in their pockets’ and ‘without a hut to shelter them’ . This obvious lack a home, and the monetary funds needed to support them [the freed slaves] and their families, together with the lack of widespread Government support meant that many slaves continued to live in poverty, and in many ways, they could have been better off (economically), had they been left in bondage . For this reason, many Southern slaves ‘had little choice but to remain as paid labourers or to become sharecroppers working on the land as before’ . Sharecropping, which generally involved the ex-slaves renting land, tools, and a house from a white landlord, working the land that is given to them, and then providing the landlord with one-half to two-thirds of the produce . ‘This system kept the black cotton producers in an inferior position’ , which means that while they were ‘officially free’; they were still stuck in the previous cycle of working for their previous masters, without hope of escape for a better life. While this is what most ex-slaves did, some, like Jourdan Anderson, who left the farm on which he, was prior to being freed, with his family, ‘would rather stay here and starve - and die’ than to have his girls ‘brought to shame by...
Fannie Lou Hamer and Malcolm X, like most civil rights activists, were exposed to the horrors of racism on a daily basis. These two leaders in particular, recognized a recurring theme of conscious oppression of Black Americans on the part of white Americans and identified the ways in which the “dominant” social group benefited from such oppression. Fannie Lou Hamer’s experience sharecropping and within the justice system helped her to develop an ideology of civil rights that centered on the empowerment of Black Americans. When Hamer was six years old the owner of the plantation on which her family lived and worked encouraged her to pick cotton. Making it seem like a game or challenge, the owner offered her a reward of food, knowing that the young girl was going hungry as a result of the limited amount of food he supplied to her family. Just like that, Hamer was tricked into picking cotton to earn minimal rewards.2 This anecdote from her life parallels the struggle of many sharecroppers at the time. Released from slavery, Black me...
Between the years of 1840 and 1914, about forty million people immigrated to the United States from foreign countries. Many of them came to find work and earn money to have a better life for their families. Others immigrated because they wanted to escape the corrupt political power of their homelands, such as the revolution in Mexico after 1911. Whatever the case, many found it difficult to begin again in a new country. Most immigrants lived in slums with very poor living conditions. They had a hard time finding work that paid enough to support a family. Not only was it difficult for immigrant men, but for women as well. Immigrant women faced many challenges including lack of education and social life as well as low wages and poor working conditions.
...however, feels that to solve the plight of the Okies, land should be set aside for them to start their own small farms, since farming is all they know. He also suggests that local committees set wages and labor needs before the harvests to protect the rights of the workers and prevent them from being extorted (Pgs 58-59). While Steinbeck’s ideas made sense and had good intent, the grim reality still remained that the corporations controlled the agriculture industry and that they were going to save every nickel and dime they could, even if it meant a lower standard of living for the Okie. Today, we have unions that attempt to prevent things like this from happening again, but the plight of illegal immigrants demonstrates that the reality of this country’s need for cheap labor remains.
Harvest Of Shame, an interesting and touching black and white documentary from the early 1960’s, documents and exposes the deploring lives of thousands of American migrant cultural workers narrated and dissected by one of the best and first American broadcast journalists called Edward Roscoe Murrow. The principal objective of this movie is not only to show the poor and miserable lives that all of these people live, but to let all the other Americans who are above these workers on the social and wealth scale know that the people who pick up their fruits, vegetables, and grains have no voice, no power, and no help to battle the inequities and mistreatment they receive.
Since the beginning of slavery in the America, Africans have been deemed inferior to the whites whom exploited the Atlantic slave trade. Africans were exported and shipped in droves to the Americas for the sole purpose of enriching the lives of other races with slave labor. These Africans were sold like livestock and forced into a life of servitude once they became the “property” of others. As the United States expanded westward, the desire to cultivate new land increased the need for more slaves. The treatment of slaves was dependent upon the region because different crops required differing needs for cultivation. Slaves in the Cotton South, concluded traveler Frederick Law Olmsted, worked “much harder and more unremittingly” than those in the tobacco regions.1 Since the birth of America and throughout its expansion, African Americans have been fighting an uphill battle to achieve freedom and some semblance of equality. While African Americans were confronted with their inferior status during the domestic slave trade, when performing their tasks, and even after they were set free, they still made great strides in their quest for equality during the nineteenth century.
“I do not believe that many American citizens . . . really wanted to create such immense human suffering . . . in the name of battling illegal immigration” (Carr 70). For hundreds of years, there has been illegal immigration starting from slavery, voluntary taking others from different countries to work in different parts of the world, to one of the most popular- Mexican immigration to the United States. Mexican immigration has been said to be one of the most common immigration acts in the world. Although the high demand to keep immigrants away from crossing the border, Mexicans that have immigrated to the U.S have made an impact on the American culture because of their self sacrifices on the aspiration to cross over. Then conditions
The. Kessner, Thomas and Betty Boyd Caroli, “Today’s Immigrants, Their Stories.” Kiniry and Rose, 343-346. Print. The. Portes, Alejandro and Ruben G. Rumbaut, “Immigrant America: A Portrait.” Kiniry and Rose, 336-337.
Burgers, soda and other “junk food” are—along with obesity—part of the American life. For that matter, it is very common for doctors in the US to urge people to consume more fresh products. Yet, paradoxically choosing this healthy diet comes with a huge price on migrant workers’ bodies. In Fresh Fruits Broken Bodies, physician and anthropologist Seth Holmes explores the structural violence perpetrated against migrant farmworkers. Throughout this 200-pages book, Holmes makes a thoughtful description of the life of the Triqui migrant farm workers and how structural forces play out in the harsh working and living conditions they experience.
In Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies, Seth Holmes gives readers an inside perspective as to what life is like for migrant farmworkers living in the U.S. He looks at the health of the of these farmworkers which he believes is being undermined by factors of racial prejudice, supply and demand, and migration. The book is about Holmes journey with these migrant workers told in a way that puts these farmworkers on a personal level instead of just being seen as labor in the fields. Holmes discovers is that these farmworkers are living in harsh conditions that are detrimental to their health. This book doesn’t just tell the story of these farmworkers, it also acts a way of getting the message out that something needs to be changed in the way that farmworkers
These workers “connected their freedom and their work” which created a gap in status over slaves and even freed slaves as they were considered the “antithesis of republican citizens” because of their inability to defend themselves. (33&36) Roediger quotes Franklin and Jefferson in their written articles which debate this thinking from an artisan point of view, but it was not fully accepted en masse. This mindset expediated the formation of white working-class racism who would continue to separate themselves from Blacks through use of
John Steinbeck’s stories depict his commiseration and compassion for the down-trodden class. He, in his stories, has summed up the bitterness of the Great Depression decade and aroused widespread sympathy for the plight of migratory farm workers. His style is natural and lucid.
In the end, Steinbeck’s book The Grapes of Wrath will continue to be debated for many years to come. However, the issue of whether or not it is a working critique of capitalism is settled. His practical criticisms of capitalism are many; his support for socialism in an illusion brought on by further attacks on capitalism, and he demonstrates the damage such a system does on the human spirit. Alas, it is obvious that Steinbeck’s intentions were to conceive a novel that accurately criticized capitalism without any heavy support of a socialist
The words “migrant workers” probably conjures up images of labourers leaving their homeland to seek for hopes and promises of a better future, toiling in an environment that reeks of unfamiliarity. After a day of slogging, they return to shelters they can hardly call home. It’s late. They think of their family back home, the wife who’s exhausted from doing housework all day, and the children who studies so hard in school with the overwhelming thought of quitting school in order to get a job to support the family. The migrant workers are hit with a pang of nostalgia, guilt, and melancholy- all at once. Nevertheless, they have to soldier on, to earn enough keep to support their family back home. It is, to say the least, unjust that they have