The first in a four-volume series on the class-struggle leadership of the strikes and organizing drives that transformed the Teamsters union in

    labor history to a wide audience. Strike! narrates the exciting hidden history of the U.S. labor movement from the point of view of the rank-and-file workers who lived it. "An exciting history of American labor....Brings to life the flashpoints of labor history....Scholarly, genuinely stirring."--The New York Times

    The authors conclude that in the games of hierarchical respect, no class can emerge the victor; and that true egalitarianism can be achieved only by rediscovering diverse concepts of human dignity. Examining personal feelings in terms of a totality of human relations, and looking beyond the struggle for economic survival, The Hidden Injuries of Class takes an important step forward in the sociological critique of everyday life.

    

    Words and music and history

    Through engagingly documented song arrangements and profiles of their singers, Jackson shows how such pieces as "Hammer Ring," "Ration Blues," "Yellow Gal," and "Jody's Got My Wife and Gone" are like no other folk music forms: they are distinctly African in heritage, diminished in power and meaning outside their prison context, and used exclusively by black convicts.The songs helped workers through the rigors of cane cutting, logging, and cotton picking. Perhaps most important, they helped resolve the men's hopes and longings and allowed them a subtle outlet for grievances they could never voice when face-to-face with their jailers.