Aimee Loiselle will discuss the 1979 movie Norma Rae and its cultural narrative of the hard-working and defiant individual who triumphs over all obstacles. While images of union organizing appear in Norma Rae, the icon generated by the movie works to normalize the individual standing alone as the primary locus of power and responsibility. The movie also worked to obscure the long history of southern labor organizing and mill hand activism as well as eliding the linked labor and activism of Puerto Rican needleworkers on the island and mainland throughout the twentieth century.
Loiselle is a doctoral candidate in the History Department and Disserttion Fellow in the Humanities Institute at UConn. She specializes in the modern U.S. as a hub for transnational labor and capital with an interest in women workers, gender, race, and popular culture. She is the author of “Austerity Undermines Every Effort at Equity and Justice” in Women, Gender, and Families of Color. She has published articles and blog posts on women’s activism, textile and garment labor, and neoliberal economic projects, such as the piece “Puerto Rican Needleworkers: A Laboratory for Neoliberalism” in El Sol Latino.
Wednesday, October 10
UConn Humanities Institute, Babbidge Library, Fourth Floor
4:00-5:30 pm
Creating Norma Rae: Southern Labor Organizing and Puerto Rican Needleworkers Lost in Reagan's America
For more information, contact: UCHI at uchi@uconn.edu