Description
Book SynopsisTakes the reader on a tour of the melon and corn harvesting fields of California's Central Valley to understand why farmworkers suffer heatstroke and chronic illness at rates higher than workers in any other industry. The author documents in detail how a tightly interwoven web of public policies and private interests create needless suffering.
Trade Review"Horton keenly advocates for measures to remedy farmworkers' health, such as ending policies of agricultural exceptionalism, reforming the health care and immigration systems, and promoting labor policies to improve farmworkers' health." * CHOICE *
"Captivating... Horton’s book comes at a critical moment to enter into discussions about undocumented migration in the US. It represents a substantial contribution to exposing the hidden reality of migrant farmworkers’ stressful lives, and also highlights potential areas of policy and law reform. Her in-depth analysis of the legal, historical, and cultural causes of migrant exploitation makes her work a relevant and eye-opening read for anyone who consumes produce in the US." * Border Criminologies *
"
They Leave Their Kidneys in the Fields will become an essential text in undergraduate and graduate classrooms. Horton has made a clear theoretical contribution to the academic fields of anthropology, the social sciences, public health, and immigration studies, and her captivating narrative will appeal to the larger general public interested in migrant health...Horton’s analysis of the structural violence experienced by undocumented farmworkers will draw a wide readership and bring much-deserved attention to this marginalized and exploited population." * American Ethnologist *
"Sarah Horton’s book is a strong reminder of why and how we should be doing ethnography in solidarity with the communities we research and write about." * Anthropology of Work Review *
"An excellent example of how to successfully produce engaged ethnographic writing that grapples with concerns of positionality, enhances empathy for vulnerable populations, and makes anthropological theory accessible to a broader readership, all of which is no easy feat." * American Anthropologist *
"Horton’s work provides a platform from which people not only lend their voice but also employ their power to promote strategies for change." * Journal of Anthropological Research *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction
1. Burning Up: Heat Illness in California’s Fields
2. Entering Farm Work: Migration and Men’s Work Identities
3. Ghost Workers: The Labor Consequences of Identity Loan
4. Presión Alta: The Physiological Toll of Farm Work
5. Álvaro’s Casket: Heat Illness and Chronic Disease at Work
6. Desabilitado: Kidney Disease and the Disability- Assistance Hole
Conclusion: Strategies for Change
Appendix A. On Engaged Anthropology and Ethnographic Writing
Appendix B. Methods
Appendix C. Core Research Participants
Notes
References
Index
