Saturday, June 15, 2019

Working People in Alberta: A History

Front Cover
                                                                      





Athabasca University Press, 2012 - History - 345 pages

Working People in Alberta traces the history of labour in
Alberta from the period of First Nations occupation to the present.
Drawing on over two hundred interviews with labour leaders, activists,
and ordinary working people, as well as on archival records, the volume
gives voice to the people who have toiled in Alberta over the
centuries. In so doing, it seeks to counter the view of Alberta as a
one-class, one-party, one-ideology province, in which distinctions
between those who work and those who own are irrelevant. Workers from
across the generations tell another tale, of an ongoing collective
struggle to improve their economic and social circumstances in the face
of a dominant, exploitative elite. Their stories are set within a
sequential analysis of provincial politics and economics, supplemented
by chapters on women and the labour movement and on minority workers
 of colour and their quest for social justice.

Published on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Alberta
Federation of Labour, Working People in Alberta contrasts the
stories of workers who were union members and those who were not. In
its depictions of union organizing drives, strikes, and working-class
life in cities and towns, this lavishly illustrated volume creates a
composite portrait of the men and women who have worked to build and

sustain the province of Alberta.







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