SINCE WASHINGTON D.C. WON'T OVERSEE ITS GUEST WORKER PROGRAMS, WASHINGTON STATE WILL (David Bacon)

SINCE WASHINGTON D.C. WON'T OVERSEE ITS GUEST WORKER PROGRAMS, WASHINGTON STATE WILL By David Bacon The American Prospect, 7/5/19 https://prospect.org/article/washington-dc-wont-oversee-its-guest-worker-programs-washington-state-will https://davidbaconrealitycheck.blogspot.com/2019/07/since-washington-dc-wont-oversee-its.html Striker at the King Fuji ranch.  Photo by Edgar Franks. Book talk on California farm workers, California Historical Society, 7/9/19 at 6PM - see below On Wednesday morning, June 12, 21 guest workers at the King Fuji ranch in Mattawa, Washington, didn't file into the company orchards as usual, to thin apples.  Instead, they stood with arms folded outside their bunkhouses, on strike and demanding to talk with company managers. According to one striker, Sergio Martinez, "we're all working as fast as we can, but the company always wants more.  When we can't make the production they're demanding they threaten us, telling us that if we don't produce they won't let us come back to work next year.  We want to speak with the company, so we're not working until they talk with us." Martinez and his friends have joined a labor upsurge among both H2-A guest workers and Washington's existing immigrant farm labor workforce, which has forced its state legislature to take action to protect both.  New York State has just acted to increase the labor rights of farm workers as well.  Meanwhile California, while it's made important advances, has yet to enact similar legislation. Martinez voiced a complaint common among H2-A guest workers.  Pressure to work harder and faster is permitted by the U.S. Department of Labor, often written into the certifications that allow growers to import workers.  The job order approved by DoL for King Fuji Ranch, Inc. lists the first reason why a worker can be fired: "malingers or otherwise refuses without justified cause to perform as directed the work for which the worker was recruited and hired."  If a worker's productivity doesn't improve after "coaching" then "the Worker may be terminated." Coaching at King Fuji, according to Martinez, means "they threaten to send us back to Mexico."  Another worker, who preferred not to give his name, explained that "they give you three tickets [warnings], and then you get fired.  They put you on the blacklist so you can't come back next year.  Workers who were fired last year aren't here this year." The contracts under which workers come to the United States in the H2-A agricultural guest worker visa program allow employers to set production quotas.  They can fire workers for any reason, and fired workers can no longer stay in the country.  In effect, getting fired for low productivity makes a worker subject to deportation.  Employers and their recruiters are allowed to maintain lists of workers who are eligible for rehire, and those who are not - in effect, a blacklist.

[. . .]

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Book talk on California farm workers:
In the Fields of the North / En los campos del norte
With David Bacon and Jose Padilla

California Historical Society
678 Mission Street
San Francisco
CA 94105
July 9, 2019 at 6PM 
 

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Exhibition Schedule
Exhibitions of photographs are scheduled for the following venues and dates:

In the Fields of the North / En los campos del norte
Scheduled exhibitions:

June 16, 2019 - August 18, 2019
The Museum of Ventura County's Agricultural Museum, Santa Paula
September 1, 2019 - December 22, 2019
Hi-Desert Nature Museum, Yucca Valley
January 5, 2020 - March 1, 2020
Community Memorial Museum of Sutter County, Yuba City
March 15, 2020 - June 21, 2020
Los Altos History Museum, Los Altos
March 21, 2021 - May 23, 2021
Carnegie Arts Center, Turlock

In Washington’s Fields 
Scheduled exhibition:

February 5, 2020 - July 15, 2020
Washington State History Museum, Tacoma, WA

More Than a Wall - The Social Movements of the Border
Scheduled exhibition:

August 29,, 2020 - November 29,, 2020
San Francisco Public Library

 

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In the Fields of the North / En los Campos del Norte
Photographs and text by David Bacon
University of California Press / Colegio de la Frontera Norte
302 photographs, 450pp, 9”x9”
paperback, $34.95 (in the U.S.)

order the book on the UC Press website:
ucpress.edu/9780520296077
use source code  16M4197  at checkout, receive a 30% discount

En Mexico se puede pedir el libro en el sitio de COLEF:
https://www.colef.mx

Los Angeles Times reviews In the Fields of the North / En los Campos del Norte - clickhere
 

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En los campos del Norte documenta la vida de trabajadores agrícolas en Estados Unidos -
Entrevista con el Instituto Nacional de la Antropologia y Historia
http://www.inah.gob.mx/es/boletines/6863-en-los-campos-del-norte-documenta-la-vida-de-trabajadores-agricolas-en-estados-unidos

Entrevista en la television de UNAM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdSaBKZ_k0o

David Bacon comparte su mirada del trabajo agrícola de migrantes mexicanos en el Museo Archivo de la Fotografia
http://www.cultura.cdmx.gob.mx/comunicacion/nota/0038-18

Trabajo agrícola, migración y resistencia cultural: el mosaico de los “Campos del Norte”
Entrevista de David Bacon por Iván Gutiérrez / A los 4 Vientos
http://www.4vientos.net/2017/10/04/trabajo-agricola-migracion-y-resistencia-cultural-el-mosaico-de-los-campos-del-norte/

"Los fotógrafos tomamos partido"
Entrevista por Melina Balcázar Moreno - Milenio.com Laberinto
http://www.milenio.com/cultura/laberinto/david_baconm-fotografia-melina_balcazar-laberinto-milenio_0_959904035.html

Das Leben der Arbeiterschaft auf Ölplattformen des Irak
http://www.nrhz.de/flyer/beitrag.php?id=25973

Die Kunst der Grenze
http://www.nrhz.de/flyer/beitrag.php?id=24304Notruf für "eine andere Welt"
http://www.nrhz.de/flyer/beitrag.php?id=24087

Die Apfel-Pflücker aus dem Yakima-Tal
http://www.nrhz.de/flyer/beitrag.php?id=23990
 

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"Documenting the Farm Worker Rebellion"
"The Radical Resistance to Immigration Enforcement"
Havens Center lectures, University of Wisconsin, click here

San Francisco Commonweallth Club presentation by David Bacon and Jose Padilla, clickhere

EN LOS CAMPOS DEL NORTE:  Farm worker photographs on the U.S./Mexico border wall
http://us7.campaign-archive2.com/?u=fc67a76dbb9c31aaee896aff7&id=0644c65ae5&e=dde0321ee7
Entrevista sobre la exhibicion con Alfonso Caraveo (Español)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJeE1NO4c_M&feature=youtu.beTHE REALITY CHECK - David Bacon blog
http://davidbaconrealitycheck.blogspot.com

Cat Brooks interview on KPFA about In the Fields of the North
https://kpfa.org/player/?audio=263826  - Advance the time to 33:15

Book TV: A presentation of the ideas in The Right to Stay Home at the CUNY Graduate Center
http://booktv.org/Watch/14961/The+Right+to+Stay+Home+How+US+Policy+Drives+Mexican+Migration.aspx

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Other Books by David Bacon

The Right to Stay Home:  How US Policy Drives Mexican Migration  (Beacon Press, 2013)
http://www.beacon.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=2328

Illegal People -- How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants  (Beacon Press, 2008)
Recipient: C.L.R. James Award, best book of 2007-2008
http://www.beacon.org/Illegal-People-P780.aspx

Communities Without Borders (Cornell University/ILR Press, 2006)
http://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/?GCOI=80140100558350

The Children of NAFTA, Labor Wars on the U.S./Mexico Border (University of California, 2004)
http://www.ucpress.edu/book.php?isbn=9780520244726

En Español:

EL DERECHO A QUEDARSE EN CASA  (Critica - Planeta de Libros)
http://www.planetadelibros.com.mx/el-derecho-a-quedarse-en-casa-libro-205607.html

HIJOS DE LIBRE COMERCIA (El Viejo Topo)
http://www.tienda.elviejotopo.com/prestashop/capitalismo/1080-hijos-del-libre-comercio-deslocalizaciones-y-precariedad-9788496356368.html?search_query=david+bacon&results=1

For more articles and images, see  http://dbacon.igc.org and http://davidbaconrealitycheck.blogspot.com
and https://www.flickr.com/photos/56646659@N05/albums