I Am Not a Tractor! : : How Florida Farmworkers Took On the Fast Food Giants and Won / / Susan L. Marquis.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Cornell University Press Complete eBook-Package 2017
• VerfasserIn: Marquis, Susan L.,
• Place / Publishing House: Ithaca, NY : : Cornell University Press, , [2017]; ©2017
• Year of Publication: 2017
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (296 p.) :; 22 b&w halftones

I Am Not a Tractor! celebrates the courage, vision, and creativity of the farmworkers and community leaders who have transformed one of the worst agricultural situations in the United States into one of the best. Susan L. Marquis highlights past abuses workers suffered in Florida’s tomato fields: toxic pesticide exposure, beatings, sexual assault, rampant wage theft, and even, astonishingly, modern-day slavery. Marquis unveils how, even without new legislation, regulation, or government participation, these farmworkers have dramatically improved their work conditions.Marquis credits this success to the immigrants from Mexico, Haiti, and Guatemala who formed the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, a neuroscience major who takes great pride in the watermelon crew he runs, a leading farmer/grower who was once homeless, and a retired New York State judge who volunteered to stuff envelopes and ended up building a groundbreaking institution. Through the Fair Food Program that they have developed, fought for, and implemented, these people have changed the lives of more than thirty thousand field workers. I Am Not a Tractor! offers a range of solutions to a problem that is rooted in our nation’s slave history and that is worsened by ongoing conflict over immigration.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Characters -- Acronyms and Organizations -- Acknowledgments -- Prologue. Getting to Immokalee -- 1. To beat one of us is to beat us all! -- 2. “Bang your head against the wall long enough . . .” -- 3. Campaigning for fair food -- 4. Has anyone talked with these guys? -- 5. Eyes wide open -- 6. Forging the path by walking it -- 7. “Value” can have a different meaning -- 8. What difference? -- 9. Designed for the future -- A note on sources -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index