Working History is the Southern Labor Studies Association's newly revamped podcast, co-produced by David Anderson (Louisiana Tech) and Olivia Paschal (Virginia). The podcast was originally created by Beth English, Princeton University, and she conducted all of the interviews from 2015 to 2020 (unless otherwise noted). Podcast episodes link directly to SoundCloud and are also available on the New Books Network, Spotify and iTunes.

Do you have thoughts on who we should feature? Let us know here.

2024

September | The Present and Future of Southern Labor: The UAW’s Historic Win at Volkswagen. SLSA conference plenary panel, recorded live at the conference, is moderated by labor journalist Sarah Jaffe and features Zach Costello of UAW Local 42’s organizing committee; Chris Brooks, chief strategist at the UAW; Michael Gilliland, the organizing director of CALEB in Chattanooga; and labor historian Nelson Lichtenstein.

April | Beyond Norma Rae: How Puerto Rican and Southern White Women Fought for a Place in the American Working Class, Aimee Loiselle, Central Connecticut State University

2023

November | Southern Exposure at 50: Sue Thrasher, Bob Hall, and Leah Wise

November | Resident Strangers: Immigrant Laborers in New South Alabama, Jennifer Brooks, Auburn University

July | Working in the Magic City: Moral Economy in Early Twentieth-Century Miami, Thomas Castillo, Coastal Carolina University

March | Freedom's Dominion: A Saga of White Resistance to Federal Power, Jefferson Cowie, Vanderbilt University

February | Re-Launch Premiere: "Labor Journalism, Farmworkers, and Reynolds Tobacco with Victoria Bouloubasis"

2020

June | Colonial Migrants at the Heart of Empire, Ismael García-Colón, City University of New York, College of Staten Island

May | Labor, Capital, and Politics in the Industrial South, Michael Goldfield, Fraser Center for Workplace Issues, Wayne State University

April | Race, Class, and Communism in the Jim Crow South, Mary Stanton, Independent Historian

February | Politics of the Pantry, Emily E. LB. Twarog, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

January | Southern Sisters and Social Justice in the Jim Crow South, Jacquelyn Dowd Hall, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

2019

October | Making the Woman Worker, Eileen Boris, University of California, Santa Barbara

September | Race, Slavery and Psychiatry, Wendy Gonaver, Chapman University

July | Reconciling a Slaveholding Past, Jody Allen, The College of William and Mary

June | Beef: Exploitation, Innovation, and How Meat Changed America, Joshua Specht, Monash University

May | Appalachia: A Regional Reckoning, Anthony Harkins, Western Kentucky University, and Meredith McCarroll, Bowdin College

March | "You Can't Eat Coal": Women's Social Justice Activism in Appalachia, Jessica Wilkerson, University of Mississippi

February | “The Last Ballad” and the Loray Mill Strike, Wiley Cash, Author

2018

December | Reconsidering Southern Labor History, Matthew Hild, Georgia Tech, and Keri Leigh Merritt, Independent Scholar

November | Slavery and Memory, Blain Roberts and Ethan J. Kytle, California State University, Fresno 

October | Revisioning the American Past through African American and Latinx History, Paul Ortiz, University of Florida

March | Shaping a New Conservatism in the South, Katherine Rye Jewell, Fitchburg State University

February | Murder, Race, and (In)Justice, Karen Cox, University of North Carolina at Charlotte

January | "Hillbilly Hellraisers" and Rethinking the Roots of Populist Politics, J. Blake Perkins, Williams Baptist College 

2017

October | Poor Whites in the Slave South, Kerry Leigh Merritt, Independent Historian

September | The High Cost of Cheap Food, Bryant Simon, Temple University

September | A New Narrative for Labor in the 1970s, Lane Windham, Georgetown University

August | Preserving Southern Labor's Past, Traci JoLeigh Drummond, Georgia State University

June | LGBT Discrimination and Activism in the Southern Workplace, Joshua Hollands, University College London

June | Southern Small Farmers Standing Their Ground, Adrienne Petty, City University of New York

May | Freedom Struggles in the Post-Civil Rights Rural South, Greta de Jong, University of Nevada, Reno

April | From Indentured Servant to Modern-Day Guestworker, Cindy Hahamovitch, University of Georgia

2016

December | The Long History of Mexican Migration to the Deep South, Julie Wiese, University of Oregon

November | Race, Identity, and Memory, Blain Roberts, California State University, Fresno

September | What Does "Working Class" Mean in American Politics?, Robyn Muncy, University of Maryland

May | Migrant Workers and Labor Relations from South Texas to the Nation, John Weber, Old Dominion University

April | Social Justice from the U.S. South to South Africa, Alex Lichtenstein, Indiana University

March | Academic Publishing in the Digital Age, Derek Krissoff, University of West Georgia Press

March | Justice for a Toxic Town, Ellen Griffith Spears, University of Alabama

February | Southern Histories through Women's Words, Melissa Walker, Converse College, and Giselle Roberts, LaTrobe University

January | The Roots of the Modern Anti-Union Movement, Chad Pearson, Collin College

2015

December | The White Whale: Why Moby Dick is a Story about the Fate of Southern Labor in the Age of Slavery, Scott Nelson, College of William and Mary

December | A Lifetime of Building Solidarity, Michael Honey, University of Washington, Tacoma

November | Women Apparel Workers in the U. S. South, Michelle Haberland, Georgia Southern University

October | Religion's Role in Organizing the South, Kenneth Fones-Wolf, West Virginia University

October | Disaster Response in Historical Perspective, Jacob Remes, SUNY Empire State College

September | Black Women Convict Laborers in the New South, Talitha LeFlouria, University of Virginia

August | Best True Stories of Life and Work on the Panama Canal, Julie Greene, University of Maryland

August | Immigrant Rights, Detentions, and Activism, Anton Flores, Alterna; Guest host: Jennifer Brooks, Auburn University

July | Tobacco, Family Farms, and Federal Policy, Evan Bennett, Florida Atlantic University

July | The Labor Question and Higher Education, Elizabeth Shermer, Loyola University Chicago

July | The Roots of Black Protest Politics, Jay Driskell, Hood College