With These Hands: The Hidden World of Migrant Farmworkers Today

by Daniel Rothenberg, Robert Coles (Foreword)

With These Hands documents the farm labor system through the presentation of a collection of voices―workers who labor in the fields, growers who manage the multi-billion dollar agricultural industry, contractors who link workers with growers, coyotes who smuggle people across the border, union organizers, lobbyists, physicians, workers' families in Mexico, farmworker children and others. The diversity of stories presents the world of migrant farmworkers as a complex social and economic system, a network of intertwined lives, showing how all Americans are bound to the struggles and contributions of our nation's farm laborers.

Genres: Nonfiction, Anthropology

352 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1998

Reviews

[Keara Jo · Rating 2 out of 5]

Read this book for my English class and I had to literally motivate myself to read it. It was just so much information and just wasn’t captivating to me. I like the awareness the book brings but that’s literally it. Not for me but possibly for others.

[Hilary]

I read this last year and then picked it up again to review for an article about immigration and the food system I was writing for the co-op newsletter. This book mixes statistics and sociological description with oral history -- it's a good approach because it's very informative AND captivating and personal. I think it would be easy to just read parts of it, too, and still feel like you learned something -- the issue, of course, is so huge that it would take more than just reading this book to get a good handle on it. It seems like things have changed since this came out, also -- for one thing, INS changed its name. Just think about the difference in these names: Immigration and Naturalization Service vs. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. I believe that the U.S. economy and immigration system create apartheid, South Africa-style, or at least very similar. We have an invisible class of people in our country who form the basis of our food economy (and what would we do without our food economy?). It's a really contradictory system, as well -- we need these workers to have our cheap food, and many other cheap things, but racism, classism, and xenophobia drive us to round people up and put them in detention centers. Some of these centers detain children. One in Texas was recently shut down due to allegations of sexual abuse. It's something we need to talk about honestly, in our country as a whole and in our communities.

[Thing Two · Rating 4 out of 5]

Daniel Rothenberg spent years interviewing migrant workers, farm owners, lobbyists, politicians, social workers, labor attorneys - just about anyone who has a dog in this fight has a voice in this book, and the voices come across loud and clear. We need a change.

He subtitles his book the hidden world of migrant farm workers, a term that hit too close for me. I know one of the farm owners in Florida (one of the good ones, thankfully!) and have spent summers in one of the small farming towns in South Carolina (one of the bad ones, unfortunately).

No answers, but lots of examples of how we got here and what we're failing to see.

[Cherie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Four stars is an average: I'd give it three stars for readability. It's well-written but darned dry; it took me months to get through because I could only read so many pages per sitting before falling asleep. It's not light reading, but there is value to the non-sensational delivery; I appreciated the even, professional tone even if my eyelids didn't. I'd give this five stars for the value of the information within. There aren't many books that change your worldview and make you think about your daily choices; this is one of them. It's an important read. Highly recommend.

[Nicole · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a great primer for learning more about the way farm work was done in the 1980-90's. It gives a comprehensive and personified view of farm labor, from every point of view possible. The stories are breathtaking; I'll never look at an apple the same way again. However, it did leave me hoping for more - I suppose I'll have to do some of my own research to catch up on changes in the last 9 years.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

This work makes incredibly effective use of dozens of oral histories from individuals from just about every perspective you can think of related to migrant farmworkers. Through their words - and short sections of text written by the author that appear between each story - you realize the complexity of the issue and how deplorable it is that very little has been achieved in the last 60 years to improve working conditions for migrant farmworkers.

[Josh Volk · Rating 5 out of 5]

A really well balanced look at the issues around farm labor in the US from all angles. Everyone should know where there food comes from and this definitely sheds some light on who picks it. I've worked with a few immigrant farm workers and their stories match the ones in the book closely, it's more common than you probably think.

[Allison]

if you have ever bought food, put it in your mouth, chewed it and swallowed it you should read this book. everyone should know more about who harvests the food we take for granted and some of their experience. its such a good book.