Strong memories of an unusual summer long ago came flooding back when the news media were filled with the story of Shirley Sherrod, the African-American Agriculture Department official from Georgia who was fired and then rehired by the Obama administration.

In case you missed it, Sherrod was fired for the beginning of a speech in which she said that, more than 20 years before, she was slow to help a couple save their farm simply because they were white. She was rehired when it turned out that the rest of the speech was about how she changed her mind, did help save the farm, and has come to believe that the most important divide is not between blacks, whites, and Hispanics but between those who have and those who don't.

In the summer of 1970, I was part of a group of northern civil rights supporters that went to the area near Albany, Georgia, to work on the New Communities farm established by Charles and Shirley Sherrod and other African American activists.

The vision of the Sherrods and other longtime civil rights organizers was to create their own town where a large-scale farm would provide an independent economic base and where they would control the schools, housing, and law enforcement.

They were courageous people, having risked their physical safety for years to challenge power relationships that had changed little since the Civil War.

Our presence at New Communities was used to show local blacks and whites that the Sherrods and their cohorts had the resources and contacts to upset the old ways. We stayed in black sharecroppers' shacks. White locals would park by the highway and gawk at us as we wielded hoes in the peanut fields. When fields of watermelon were ripe, we harvested them, and several of us drove truckloads to New York to sell to stoned-out audiences listening to Grand Funk Railroad at Fillmore East. (A journal of the summer's experience was published as a book, Watermelon Summer, by Jeff Golden.)

We were but a footnote in the long struggle by the Sherrods and many others that continues to this day. The Shirley Sherrod firing fiasco brought back memories and served as a reminder of how much still needs to be done.

New and worth noting...

The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander (The New Press). The civil rights movement challenged employment and housing discrimination and the denial of voting rights and access to education. Today, however, millions of people of color are denied basic rights because they are in jail or are convicted felons. A law professor and former ACLU attorney documents how mass incarceration has become a new legal form of Jim Crow - and asks why progressive Americans, including traditional civil rights groups, are doing so little about it.
The Can Man by Laura E. Williams and Craig Orback (Lee and Low). In this children's book, a young boy watches a neighbor collect cans for survival after becoming homeless because of hard times. The boy gets the idea that he could collect the cans instead in order to buy a new skateboard. Eventually, the man teaches him some lessons about human kindness and community.
Yasmin's Hammer by Ann Malaspina and Doug Ghayka (Lee and Low). A girl in Bangladesh yearns to go to school, but her family's survival depends on the income she makes working in a brickyard. This children's story gently explores conditions and dilemmas that are unfamiliar to many Americans.
Dreams of Repair by Eleanor Rubin (Charta). As Howard Zinn suggests in his introduction to this collection of works by a longtime printmaker and watercolor artist, Rubin's art responds to suffering in the world but on a life-affirming, emotional level rather than as propaganda.Were You Born on the Wrong Continent? by Thomas Geoghegan (The New Press). Germany's economy is far healthier than the U.S.'s by virtually every measure, yet Germans enjoy far more paid time off and superior social benefits such as education, child care,  and health care. In Geoghegan's usual meandering storytelling style, he recounts multiple trips to Germany to understand why their version of capitalism seems to be working better than America's.
The Climate War by Eric Pooley (Hyperion). A veteran journalist describes the inside story of the political fight over climate change legislation, including the role White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel has played in delaying and weakening Obama administration efforts on the issue.
The Progressive's Guide to Raising Hell by Jamie Court (Chelsea Green). A consumer activist shares his thoughts about issue campaigning. One of his themes is that the key to victory often is to force a more powerful opponent into making a mistake you can exploit.
Customer Service by Benoit Duteurtre (Melville House). In this novella, a French journalist loses his smart phone and enters into 74 pages of hellishly frustrating interaction with today's impersonal corporations.
1877: America's Year of Living Violently by Michael A. Bellesiles (The New Press). 1877, like 1968 or 2001, was a year in which events converged to change the course of U.S. history. An historian writes in accessible style about a year of economic depression in which white mobs attacked African Americans and Mexicans, a national railroad strike headlined a series of major battles between working people and big capital, and the U.S. Army faced stiff resistance from Native Americans.
Solidarity Stories by Harvey Schwartz (University of Washington). An oral history of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union features first-person memories from union officials such as longtime president Harry Bridges as well as rank-and-file workers from the Pacific Coast ports, fields of Hawaii, and Powell's bookstore in Portland, OR.
Frederick Law Olmsted: Essential Texts edited by Robert Twombly (W.W. Norton). Olmsted designed some of the most famous public parks in America. This collection of his writings reveals his thoughts about landscape architecture and the development of cities.

FILMS
Sweet Crude.  This 93-minute documentary explores corruption, environmental damage, and civil conflict surrounding oil production in Nigeria, the source of more than 10 percent of the U.S. oil supply.
Citizen Architect. An hour-long film portrays a program of Auburn University that gives architecture students a chance to work closely with poor communities in rural Alabama to find innovative solutions to meet their housing needs.
Reel Injun. In this 88-minute documentary, a Cree filmmaker makes fun of the way stereotypes about native peoples have been created or reinforced by portrayals in Hollywood movies through the years.

BY MATT WITT

This edition of the free bulletin, World Wide Work, is published by the American Labor Education Center, an independent nonprofit founded in 1979.

WORLD WIDE WORK

New and worth noting...

FILMS
Entre Nos. An immigrant from Colombia raised her two children alone in the U.S., supporting them by collecting cans from the city's garbage. Now, her daughter and another filmmaker have collaborated to tell her story in an 82-minute tearjerker.
Frozen Dreams (centroixim66@hotmail.com). In 2007, 160 immigrant workers at a Del Monte food packing plant in Oregon were detained in a federal raid. Some of them tell their story in this 30-minute film, which also includes footage showing why immigrant workers come to the U.S. in the first place.
8: The Mormon Proposition. A former Mormon evangelist who is now a journalist directed this 78-minute documentary about how the Mormon Church drove the initiative campaign in California that took away the right of gays and lesbians to marry. The film says the Mormons plowed $30 million into the campaign through front groups, while bringing in canvassers from Utah who were instructed not to wear white shirts and ties that would identify their affiliation. Interviewees include a gay descendant of one of the church's original founders.
Word is Out. This 2 hour and 15 minute film was originally issued in 1977 and has now been restored. It is believed to have been the first feature-length documentary about lesbian and gay identity, featuring moving, intimate interviews with 26 people of many different backgrounds. It provides a good history lesson, while provoking thoughts about what has and has not changed.
Obselidia. In this entertaining 97-minute feature, shot in L.A. and Death Valley, a librarian spends his off hours compiling an encyclopedia of obsolete things as he mourns the rapid disappearance of American cultural traditions. He also studies the deadly effects of climate change, which he learns may already be irreversible. After he interviews a silent movie theater projectionist for his book, the two strike up a friendship and help each other find joy and beauty in an increasingly troubled world.
Whiz Kids. Coming of age is a different experience for high school students engaged in serious scientific research and competing in a prestigious national competition. This 82-minute film focuses on three - an immigrant from Pakistan, a first-generation Ecuadorian-American, and a student in Parkersburg, West Virginia, who researches a pollutant dumped in the Ohio River by the region's largest employer.
The Most Dangerous Man in America. Daniel Ellsberg risked life in prison to leak secret Pentagon documents showing the government's deception about the Vietnam War. This 94-minute documentary dramatically raises the question of why a few individuals go against the tide and challenge the powerful despite the likely personal cost.

BOOKS
The Crying Tree by Naseem Rakha (Broadway). In this masterfully written novel, a 15-year-old Oregon boy is killed at home by a 19-year-old intruder. As the legal system takes many years to process the case, the victim's mother believes that only the execution of the man who killed her son will bring her closure. Over time, she learns deeper truths about the crime, about herself, and about human connection.
Green Gone Wrong by Heather Rogers (Scribner). Many Americans feel that we are taking meaningful action about climate change by substituting cloth shopping bags for plastic ones or buying organic food. But really doing something requires joining together to win government action to control greenhouse gas emissions, develop and distribute alternative energy, invest in mass transit, encourage sustainable local food production, and address the global wealth gap.
Ending the U.S. War in Afghanistan by David Wildman and Phyllis Bennis (Olive Branch). In question and answer format, analysts from the United Methodist Church and the Institute of Policy Studies provide essential background on the real reasons for the Bush invasion of Afghanistan and the continuation of the war by President Obama. They also address the question of how the U.S. can bring its involvement to an end.
13 Bankers by Simon Johnson and James Kwak (Pantheon). This book explains in convincing detail how Wall Street destroyed the economy, why elected officials and regulators in both the Bush and Obama administrations failed to take the necessary action, and what ought to be done now.
Colorblind by Tim Wise (City Lights). America needs not to "move beyond" race but to adopt innovative public policies that directly address it. Wise gives specific ideas of what those policies might be. Also worth reading is a recent blog entry by the same author, Imagine if the Tea Party was Black.
No One is Illegal by Justin Akers Chacon and Mike Davis (Haymarket). This timely and informative book makes clear that current immigration policy is deliberately designed to ensure a supply of cheap labor for corporate interests. It recounts the history of anti-immigrant violence and discrimination in the U.S. and describes the current movement for real immigration reform.
Seeds of Change by John Atlas (Vanderbilt University). The president of the National Housing Institute has written an impressively detailed, thoughtful, and honest history of ACORN, from its founding to its recent reorganization forced by right-wing attacks.
Share This! by Deanna Zandt (Berrett-Koehler). An experienced progressive activist shares her knowledge and insights about the potential and limits of social networking.
The Autobiography of an Execution by David R. Dow (Twelve). A Texas law professor who has handled appeals in more than a hundred death penalty cases provides a powerful personal account of the issues, contradictions, and stresses that his work involves.
A Shameful Business by James A. Gross (Cornell University). Politicians of various stripes occasionally find it useful to decry human rights abuses in other countries. This book details the human rights abuses built into the American workplace, where property rights are consistently valued over workers' rights.
Spirit of Rebellion by Jarod Roll (University of Illinois). In Missouri in the 1930s, black and white farmers inspired by Pentecostal revivals joined forces to fight for economic justice.
When Chicken Soup Isn't Enough edited by Suzanne Gordon (Cornell University). Seventy registered nurses, most of them in the U.S., tell briefly about times they have challenged obstacles to providing quality patient care. Most of these vignettes involve individual action such as confronting a doctor or administrator.
God and Sex: What the Bible Really Says by Michael Coogan (Twelve). Political activists often cite the Bible for validation of their views. But the book was written thousands of years ago by a number of different writers in a time when social customs were very different from our own, according to this dispassionate history by a professor of religious studies.
The Illuminated Landscape edited by Gary Noy and Rick Heide (Heyday). This varied anthology of essays, poetry, and stories focuses on the Sierra Nevada region of California from the earliest days of human habitation to the present. It includes work by local authors as well as excerpts from works by some of America's most famous writers.
Victors' Justice From Nuremberg to Baghdad by Danilo Zolo (Verso). An Italian academic argues that international law is not impartial but political, legitimizing imperialism and labeling resistance as terrorism.

MUSIC
Love Filling Station by Jesse Winchester (Appleseed). After a long career, Winchester still has a beautiful voice and a knack for fresh and tight lyrics and melodies.
Agridustrial by Legendary Shack Shakers (Colonel Knowledge/Thirty Tigers). Harsh hard rock, including percussion sounds recorded in a blacksmith's forge, provide the backdrop for angry rants about hard times, past and present, in rural America.

Please share this bulletin with others and encourage them to subscribe, which they can do at TheWorkSite.org, our site that provides free, adaptable tools for grassroots education and organizing. (Subscribing to the bulletin is free, and we never share our email list with anyone).

This edition of the free bulletin, World Wide Work, is published by the American Labor Education Center, an independent nonprofit founded in 1979.

WORLD WIDE WORK

Even the inadequate reforms contained in the federal health care bill would not have been achieved without thousands of protests outside insurance company offices and other grassroots action. During this event in Medford, Oregon, a local TV reporter interviewed a leader of Oregon Action who said too many of us are left uncovered when we need care. Information about pushing for further federal and state action can be found from Health Care for America Now, which supported the Democrats' bill and is now organizing to enforce and improve it.

New and worth noting...

FILMS
Outrage. This hard-hitting 89-minute film focuses on closeted gay politicians who cynically take strong stands against gay and lesbian rights. One who is featured is Florida Governor Charlie Crist, now a candidate for U.S. Senate. The film discusses Crist's history of having gay relationships, carrying out anti-gay policies, and suddenly acquiring a female partner during election campaigns, only to "break up" immediately after the votes are counted.
On the Road to Tel-Aviv.  A brilliant 15-minute short shows Israeli Jews getting on a bus not long after another bus was blown up by suicide bombers. An Arab woman carrying a large bag gets on the bus, and the passengers panic. The story provides a great starting point for discussion about profiling and about actions individuals will take when in a group seized by fear.
Objectified. In this wide-ranging 76-minute documentary, cutting edge designers of consumer goods from around the world show how they do their work. They also talk about being caught between corporations' short-term profit motive and their own desire to design products that are sustainable and that serve the needs of the great majority of humanity that is not wealthy.
The Four-Faced Liar. This endearing and clever 84-minute feature artfully adds 21^st century dimensions to the coming of age genre as an uptight young woman soon to be married finds that her true love is female.
The Solitary Life of Cranes. Unusual footage in this 27-minute documentary shows what crane operators see from high above London, although not as much as it might about the actual work they do.
Garbage Dreams. In Cairo, 60,000 people made their living collecting the city's garbage and recycling 80 percent of it. Now, foreign firms have been brought in, using modern equipment but recycling only about 20 percent of the waste. The makers of this 60-minute documentary are encouraging community groups to use the film in local events to provoke discussion.

BOOKS
Moving Millions by Jeffrey Kaye (Wiley). As the national debate about immigration heats up again, a former reporter for PBS NewsHour shows that the policy changes being discussed do not address the underlying reasons that cause people to emigrate in the first place, including their own poverty and powerlessness and the hunger of multinational corporations for cheap and exploitable labor.
Everything but the Coffee by Bryant Simon (University of California). This thoughtful, in-depth study of Starbucks and its customers concludes that Americans want what the company claims it offers - community, fair treatment of workers and food producers, and protection of the environment. But it questions whether consuming the products of big corporations like Starbucks actually yields those outcomes.
Working edited by Hart, Mangino, Murphy, and Taliercio (New City Community and Syracuse University). A diverse group of working people in Syracuse took part in writing workshops and produced this powerful anthology of stories, poems, and photographs about the lives of postal workers, waitresses, electricians, truck drivers, telemarketers, firefighters, nurses, and others.
If The Church Were Christian by Philip Gulley (HarperOne). A Quaker minister suggests that if churches more closely followed Jesus' values and teachings, it would focus more on inclusion rather than exclusion, reconciliation rather than judgment, meeting needs rather than maintaining institutions, and inviting questions rather than insisting on rigid answers.
Rematerial by Alejandro Bahamon and Maria Cimla Sanjines (W.W. Norton). One step toward sustainability is to design buildings using materials that have previously been considered "waste." This includes converting existing structures to new purposes rather than tearing them down, recycling used building materials, and making use of waste products such as paper cups and scrap wood and metal. This book combines text and photos to show examples from all over the world.
Revolt on Goose Island by Kari Lydersen (Melville House). The sit-down strike by workers at Republic Windows & Doors in Chicago in December, 2008, became a symbol of working people's frustration with the increasing gap in wealth and power in America. A Washington Post reporter was on the scene and makes the story come alive.
If We Can Change the White House, We Can Change the Hog House by Gene Bruskin (genebruskin@gmail.com). In a 20-page, pocket-size booklet, the former director of the successful campaign to win a union contract for mostly Latino and African American workers at the Smithfield meatpacking plant in North Carolina tells the story in the form of a rap-style poem.
At the Altar of the Bottom Line by Tom Juravich (University of Massachusetts). Four case studies show how corporations' profits-before-people mentality is affecting working people in the U.S. The stories focus on a Verizon call center, a fish-processing plant staffed by undocumented workers, Boston Medical Center, and a machinery factory that was closed despite the best efforts of a highly skilled workforce. The book comes with a CD that includes four original songs by the author, a well known musician.
Working for Justice edited by Ruth Milkman, Joshua Bloom, and Victor Narro (Cornell University). Los Angeles, once one of the country's most antiunion towns, is now a center of innovative organizing strategies, as shown by these 11 case studies.
Hazard by Gardiner Harris (Minotaur). As the recent Massey mine disaster in West Virginia reminded the nation of the dangers of coal mining without union safety protections, the public health reporter for the New York Times released his new mystery novel about corporate and governmental abuses in the mines of eastern Kentucky.
Cesar Chavez: A Photographic Essay by Ilan Stavans (Cinco Puntos) tells the story of Chavez's role in United Farm Worker organizing, using photos and a small amount of text aimed mainly at young people.

MUSIC
The Big To-Do by Drive-By Truckers (ATO). A number of the tracks center on crime and the burdens of substance abuse, but songs with other themes are mixed in, including "This F---ing Job," whose point can be gleaned from the title, and "Eyes Like Glue," reflecting the songwriter's thoughts about his life as he's being watched by his young son.

Please share this bulletin with others and encourage them to subscribe, which they can do at TheWorkSite.org, our site that provides free, adaptable tools for grassroots education and organizing. (Subscribing to the bulletin is free, and we never share our email list with anyone).

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The latest edition of the free emailed bulletin, World Wide Work, highlights the following. If you are not already signed up to receive it, you can do so by clicking on the button to the left.  

New and worth noting...

BOOKS
Sea of Poppies by Amitay Ghosh (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux). One of the best written and most engaging novels to come along in years. It follows the interlocking stories of a range of intriguing characters and at the same time tells a lot about India's roots from the days of British colonial rule.
The Sound of Water by Sanjay Bahadur (Atria International). This short novel about coal miners in India tells a very human story while conveying the author's cynical view of that country's hierarchical and bureaucratic culture.
Timber Beasts by S.L. Stoner (Yamhill Press). This entertaining mystery novel is set against the background of the struggles between timber workers and big logging interests in the early 1900s.
Can They Do That? By Lewis Maltby (Portfolio). Without a union, constitutional rights generally stop at the workplace door. In most cases, it is legal for companies to fire or discipline workers for their political views or their private lifestyle. Increasingly, corporations test applicants for genetic diseases or personal psychological profiles before making hiring decisions. Some employers use the Global Positioning System capacity of company-issued cell phones to track workers' activities during off hours. The U.S. frequently criticizes human rights violations in other countries, but maintains a system of employment law that allows corporations to trample on workers' fundamental rights every day.
I am Not Sidney Poitier by Percival Everett (Graywolf). Everett is an equal opportunity satirist, skewering everyone from white Americans to the black middle class to Hollywood, Ted Turner, Jane Fonda, and even himself, an African American college professor. It helps to be familiar with the major films Poitier appeared in.
Teaching What Really Happened by James W. Loewen (Teachers College Press). A guide for students, parents, and teachers who want to analyze class and racial bias in how history is taught in most American schools and then look in new ways at such topics as the "conquest" of North America, slavery, the Civil War, and race relations today.
On a Dollar a Day by Christopher Greenslate and Kerri Leonard (Hyperion). Two high school teachers in southern California decide to limit their food budget to the dollar a day that many of the world's people exist on. Then they try the federal government's official Thrifty Food Plan for people on food stamps. In the process, they explore a range of fundamental issues about food and justice.
Mothers' Work and Children's Lives by Rucker C. Johnson, Ariel Kalil, and Rachel E. Dunifon (Upjohn Institute). Welfare reform under President Clinton was supposed to help children by pushing their mothers into the workforce. More than a decade later, studies show that children generally do benefit when their mothers are provided work with good wages and consistent hours, but suffer increased behavioral problems and poor performance in school if their mothers are pressured to work irregular hours in unstable, low-wage jobs.
NAFTA and Labor in North America by Norman Caulfield (University of Illinois). On the 20^th anniversary of the beginning of the negotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement, workers in the U.S., Mexico, and Canada are all worse off. Traditional union strategies based primarily on affecting national trade policies have proven to be inadequate in a global economy in which capital knows no boundaries.|
The End of the Revolution by Wang Hui (Verso). A Chinese professor challenges in intellectual terms China's one-party, bureaucratic state and the capitalist model being imported by global corporations.
Agitate! Educate! Organize! by Lincoln Cushing and Timothy W. Drescher (Cornell University Press). High-quality reproductions of more than 250 posters related to the U.S. labor movement, together with text that provides background.
Capitalism Hits the Fan by Richard D. Wolff (Interlink). An explanation of America's current economic crisis, which the author has also produced in a video version by the same name from Media Education Foundation.
The Wonder of Whiffling by Adam Jacot de Boinod (Particular Books).  A quirky book about particularly expressive and unusual words culled from all over the English speaking world throughout the ages. The section on expressions in the workplace, for example, tells the meaning of "swallowing the frog" or a "seagull manager."

FILMS
No Impact Man. An unusually honest, fun, and thought provoking 90-minute documentary follows a New York couple who conduct a year-long demonstration project in sustainable living, doing without petroleum-powered transportation, disposable packaging, food that is not produced locally, electronic conveniences, and more. In the process, they discover that this new way of living without a focus on television and consumer culture opens the way to more quality family time and community relationships.
The Necessities of Life. This well acted,102-minute film provides a warm and touching portrait of an Inuit man and boy who are affected by a tuberculosis epidemic in the early 1950s and are taken far from their native land to a hospital in Quebec City.
The Coca-Cola Case. This 85-minute documentary follows a campaign supported by U.S. unions aimed at holding Coca-Cola legally accountable for the murder of union leaders and activists in Colombia. Company lawyers have been trying to prevent the film from being seen.
Mother Jones: America's Most Dangerous Woman. This 24-minute documentary provides useful visuals for labor history classes, focusing on one of America's most famous union organizers.

WEBSITES
Zinn Education Project: Teaching a People's History features more than 75 free, downloadable teaching activities to bring a people's history to middle- and high- school classrooms. Included are some of the best history-teaching articles from the archives of Rethinking Schools magazine. The site also lists hundreds of recommended books, films and websites.

MUSIC
Before & After by Carrie Newcomer (Rounder). Newcomer continues to avoid clichés as she applies her clear voice and songwriting skills to explore spirituality and community in everyday life.
One Stolen Night by John Jorgenson Quintet (J2Records). An American jazz guitarist in the Django Reinhardt tradition shows good range within the broad genre.
Whatcha Gonna Do by Claire Lynch (Rounder). More bluegrass that's not just about Mama and drinking.

EXCERPT

From "To Waste at Trees" by Gerald Barrax Sr. in Black Nature: Four Centuries of African American Nature Poetry edited by Camille T. Dungy (University of Georgia Press):
Black men building a Nation,
My Brother said,
Have no leisure like them
No right to waste at trees
Inventing names for wrens and weeds.
But it's when you don't care about the world
That you begin owning and destroying it
Like them...

Forget this and let them make us deceive ourselves
That seasons have no meanings for us
And like them
We are slaves again.

Please share this bulletin with others and encourage them to subscribe, which they can do at TheWorkSite.org, our site that provides free, adaptable tools for grassroots education and organizing. Subscribing to the bulletin is free, and we never share our email list with anyone).

Tax-deductible contributions to support TheWorkSite.org and this bulletin may be sent to the American Labor Education Center, 2721 Quail Run Rd., Talent, OR 97540. Or click on Donate on TheWorkSite.org