"How 1,000 Latina workers in Watsonville, California won an 18-month long strike . . . an inspiring tale" (Mae M. Ngai, author of Impossible Subjects and The Lucky Ones)On September 9, 1985, a predominately Mexican group of one thousand women workers in Watsonville, California, the "frozen food capital of the world," were forced out on strike in response to an attempt by Watsonville Canning owner Mort Console to break their union....

The engrossing, insightful, and personal musical odyssey of Peter Shapiro, perhaps the most notable independent concert promoter since Bill GrahamPeter Shapiro is the best known and most influential concert promoter of his generation. He owned the legendary Wetlands in Tribeca and has gone on to much bigger things, including Brooklyn Bowl (NYC, Las Vegas, Philadelphia, and Nashville), the Capitol Theatre in Port Chester, producing U2 3D, and promoting the ...

Since it was founded in 1982, The Wire magazine has covered a vast range of alternative, experimental, underground and non-mainstream music. Now some of that knowledge has been distilled into The Wire Primers: a comprehensive guide to the core recordings of some of the most visionary and inspiring, subversive and radical musicians on the planet, past and present. Each chapter surveys the musical universe of a particular artist, group or genre by way of a contextualizing i...

An engrossing and insightful memoir by Peter Shapiro, the best known and most influential concert promoter of his generationPeter Shapiro is perhaps the most notable independent concert promoter since Bill Graham. He owned the legendary Wetlands in Tribeca and has gone onto much bigger things, including Brooklyn Bowl (NYC, Las Vegas, Philadelphia, and Nashville), the Capitol Theatre in Portchester, producing U2 3D, and promoting the Grateful Dead's 50th an...

In this hugely praised narrative, New York Times reporter Larry Rohter takes the reader on a lively trip through Brazil's history, culture, and booming economy. Going beyond the popular stereotypes of samba, supermodels, and soccer, he shows us a stunning and varied landscape--from breathtaking tropical beaches to the lush and dangerous Amazon rainforest--and how a complex and vibrant people defy definition. He charts Brazil's amazing jump from a debtor nation to one of the world's fastest...

The gripping story of one American lawyer’s obsessive crusade—waged at any cost—against Big Oil on behalf of the poor farmers and indigenous tribes of the Amazon rainforest.Steven Donziger, a self-styled social activist and Harvard educated lawyer, signed on to a budding class action lawsuit against multinational Texaco (which later merged with Chevron to become the third-largest corporation in America). The suit sought reparations for the Ecuadorian peasants and t...

Why David Sometimes Wins tells the story of Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers' groundbreaking victory, drawing important lessons from this dramatic tale. Since the 1900s, large-scale agricultural enterprises relied on migrant labor--a cheap, unorganized, and powerless workforce. In 1965, when some 800 Filipino grape workers began to strike under the aegis of the AFL-CIO, the UFW soon joined the action with 2,000 Mexican workers and turned the strike into a civil rights stru...

On the same day that reporter Jeffrey Kaye visited the Tondo hospital in northwest Manila, members of an employees association wearing hospital uniforms rallied in the outside courtyard demanding pay raises. The nurses at the hospital took home about $261 a month, while in the United States, nurses earn, on average, more than fifteen times that rate of pay. No wonder so many of them leave the Philippines.Between 2000 and 2007, nearly 78,000 qualified nurses left the Philippines to ...

Grassroots social movements played a major role electing left-leaning governments throughout Latin America. Subsequent relations between these states and "the streets" remain troubled. Contextualizing recent developments historically, Dangl untangles the contradictions of state-focused social change, providing lessons for activists everywhere.

The charismatic former president of Mexico offers a candid and provocative perspective on the state of world affairs.As president of Mexico, Vicente Fox brought true democracy to the country after seven decades of one party rule. Elected as a political outsider with a message of honesty, change, and hope, he is truly a hero of democracy, and this vivid book interweaves his inspiring personal story with his hopeful new vision for the future of the Americas.P...

Among the top ten oil exporters in the world and a founding member of OPEC, Venezuela currently supplies 11 percent of U.S. crude oil imports. But when the country elected the fiery populist politician Hugo Chavez in 1998, tensions rose with this key trading partner and relations have been strained ever since. In this concise, accessible addition to Oxford's What Everyone Needs to Know® series, Miguel Tinker Salas -- a native of Venezuela who has written extensively about the coun...

The mistakes the United States has made in Latin America—and the high price it will pay for themCould it be that for the first time in history, the United States needs Latin America more than the other way round? Since the early 1800s, the United States regarded the region as its “backyard,” but in the past decade South America’s leaders have increasingly snubbed US efforts to persuade them to adopt free-market economics and sign trade agreements. While Washington ...