Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 2 of 2
Full-Text Articles in American Studies
Protest Lyrics At Work: Labor Resistance Poetry Of Depression-Era Autoworkers, Rebecca S. Griffin
Protest Lyrics At Work: Labor Resistance Poetry Of Depression-Era Autoworkers, Rebecca S. Griffin
Doctoral Dissertations
This dissertation argues that scholarly inquiry into American poetry of the Great Depression is incomplete without a critical understanding of poems produced within the labor movement. Through archival research and methodologies drawn from American studies, gender studies, cultural studies, and labor history, this dissertation demonstrates that autoworkers from 1935-1941 developed a rich poetic discourse that championed their cause. Autoworker poets—including autoworker song lyricists—used humor and borrowed extensively from popular, religious, and “folk” cultures to craft their own poetic styles and trope sets. They wrote about a diverse range of topics from their hopes for the unionization movement, to scab conversions, …
Minor Subjects In America: Everyday Childhoods Of The Long Nineteenth Century, Gina M. Ocasion
Minor Subjects In America: Everyday Childhoods Of The Long Nineteenth Century, Gina M. Ocasion
Doctoral Dissertations
In my American studies dissertation, I argue that contrary to dominant discourses of separation between spaces of childhood and adulthood, representations of indigeneity, both explicit and implied, affirm the quotidian presence of social and political structures naturalized through children’s culture. Children’s literature, Native American autobiographies, and advice literatures historicize gendered inequalities reliant on particular racial representations. In other words, the intersections of gendered and racialized inequalities surface forcefully in these genres as spaces produced to reify the subjugation of minor and marginal identities through historical narratives. I understand children and the spaces they inhabit to constantly negotiate power, agency, and …