Draft Essay # 2 Assignment
History 30B: History of Chicanos since 1848
Spring 2024
Due Date: TBA (toward end of March)
Exploring the History of the Farm Worker Movement Through Historical Evidence & Contemporary Research
Objectives:
Understanding the history of the farm worker movement from a variety of perspectives
Applying research skills to the history of the farm worker movement using a variety of evidence
Analyzing primary and secondary source evidence to construct historical narrative
Evaluating the importance of farm workers in Chicano and United States History
Evaluating the relationship between the past and the present
Creating new interpretive historical narratives and archives generation
Overview: In this assignment, you will use primary and secondary sources to explore the history of the farm worker movement. The farm worker movement was an important catalyst event in modern Chicano history, galvanizing a Mexican American civil rights struggle, as well as serving as a cultural renaissance for a larger Chicano/a nationalist movement. César Chávez, Dolores Huerta, and other multiethnic participants and leaders in the farm worker movement helped bring national and international attention to the struggles of farm workers, including fair working conditions, but also social justice issues beyond wages, contracts, and working conditions. La causa, as the broader social movement came to be known, was championed by ethnic Mexican communities and their allies across the United States. Critical to the struggle were the contributions of other ethnic minority groups beyond Mexican Americans, for example, sympathetic white American consumers who supported farm worker boycotts, Filipinos, African Americans, and women. The farm worker movement was uniquely a multiracial movement and moment in United States history in the late 1960s and 1970s.
Directions:
https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/worksheets
Step 1: Using the primary and secondary source evidence linked below, select 3 primary sources to explore the history of the farm worker movement. Complete worksheets for each of the primary sources you select, e.g., photograph, written document, artifact, etc. Visit the National Archives website to find the Document Analysis Worksheets for Intermediate or Secondary Students that list the different worksheets for evidence type, e.g., photograph, written document, artifact, etc. These completed worksheets will be submitted as a pre-writing assignment and are a requirement for submitting your draft # 2 essay.
Step 2: Use these primary source analysis worksheets to help you construct a 1,250-1,500 word narrative essay exploring aspects of the farm worker movement brought forth in your source selections. As you will be submitting a draft and revision of this essay assignment, in your primary source analysis worksheets, make sure to answer the question about what potential secondary sources and further research might be needed in order for you to have a deeper historical understanding and contextualization to the primary sources selected for this assignment. I’ve listed below some possible secondary sources for you to explore. For the draft stage, the emphasis should first be on analyzing the primary sources. During the revision stage, it is more appropriate to include the secondary sources necessary to provide deeper and more meaningful historical context to your primary source analysis. However, this is a balancing act and if at the draft stage you wish to include secondary sources to support your primary source analysis, go for it! But do not supplant or diminish your focus on primary source analysis at the draft stage by focusing on summarizing secondary source content.
When you are ready to craft your thesis and organize your narrative, consider the following questions as guidelines to formulate your historical argument:
In what ways do the primary sources you select shed light on the diverse history of the farm worker movement? How do the sources help you better understand the ways ordinary people were impacted by this important moment of the Chicano/a civil rights era?
Other Important Notes: Please follow directions closely for this assignment. Completing all steps is necessary for success, from selecting primary sources to explore, to completing the primary source analysis worksheets, to drafting the essay, and then onward toward revisions. Finally, at the end of the semester, you will in some capacity be presenting aspects of your research and writing process in the portfolio assignment, which will require you to discuss publicly your research and writing related to this assignment.
Primary Source Options for Research
Suggested Oral History/Personal Essays Written by First-Hand Participants (there are others to choose from on the Farm Worker Movement Documentation Project website; explore!)
Interview with Susan Drake
https://libraries.ucsd.edu/farmworkermovement/essays/essays/003%20Drake_Susan.pdf
Interview with Gilbert Padilla
https://libraries.ucsd.edu/farmworkermovement/essays/essays/005%20Padilla_Gilbert.pdf
Interview with Chris Hartmire
https://libraries.ucsd.edu/farmworkermovement/essays/essays/006%20Hartmire_Chris.pdf
Interview with Jessie De La Cruz
https://libraries.ucsd.edu/farmworkermovement/essays/essays/010%20De%20La%20Cruz_Jessie.pdf
Interview with Andy Imutan
https://libraries.ucsd.edu/farmworkermovement/essays/essays/015%20Imutan_Andrew.pdf
Interview with Elaine Elinson
https://libraries.ucsd.edu/farmworkermovement/essays/essays/054%20Elinson_Elaine.pdf
Interview with Gloria Rodriguez
https://libraries.ucsd.edu/farmworkermovement/essays/essays/GLORIA%20SERDA%20RODRIGUEZ%20ESSAY.pdf
“My Life as a Farmworker in the 1960s” by Yolanda Barrera
Memoir Narrative: “My Life as a Farmworker in the 1960s” by Yolanda Barrera
Oral History Interview with Cynthia Bonta
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/11651/archive/files/0d6c9fe0a6a756bcfe7a70f032194a40.pdf?Expires=1709769600&Signature=IZ78JmgwqZq5%7ECLHg9C-tdj-ZYOb4pU%7EE9NKpDGgtRzdHu99ZoPL4ZmD0mCUqo097iN9KY90Af3B%7EE%7Egos1q2g9dy4ANom4NnugMwFQgCcDVZW9bFl-kDXtlUJJow1Eg3t6WkGQxN1KUDO0wPQa%7EnSdK-%7E6XRqfIn-JuHZSgOONPoKT4zmN7fOgi6lplZsSAm7Y3Pvq52bfz8YKimDNCu0EJ%7Efk3yKbbR-46ei5mbIvdAUcYU8i73f3IAObRjUGCPIbLNXIWk7ydJbpevETyykwQv6rqKUfUJzKIVB9TKwmBxOrS3rIZ4B4APxOUa30Fv7eYb-scWy-bmXInp5mwZQ__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
Interview with Doug Adair
https://libraries.ucsd.edu/farmworkermovement/essays/essays/017%20Adair_Doug.pdf
Visual Evidence/Historical Artifacts
https://libraries.ucsd.edu/farmworkermovement/
There is lots of visual evidence and historical artifacts you can find at the Farm Worker Movement project website if you explore. The search tabs are fairly easy to navigate and have an “archives” and “documents” tab. The site is run by UC San Diego, so it’s pretty user-friendly.
Secondary Source Options for Potential Inclusion in Revision Process
Yemeni Farm Workers and the Politics of Arab Nationalism in the UFW
“Yemeni Farm Workers and the Politics of Arab Nationalism in the UFW” by Neama Alamri
“Now We Work Just as One”: The United Farm Workers in Florida Citrus, 1972–1977 by Terrell Orr
Chapter 5-6 in Neil Foley’s Mexicans in the Making of America
Documentaries & Multimedia for Potential Inclusion in Revision Process
https://digital.utsa.edu/digital/collection/p15125coll5/id/3758/
Voices of the UFW in Texas, 1966-2013
Latino Americans, Episode 5 “Prejudice and Pride” (available through BC Library Academic Video Online)
CSU Northridge’s Farm Worker Movement Collection You Tube Channel
Contemporary newspaper and media
“Not the Cesar I Knew,” by Marhsal Ganz (The Nation, 2014)
https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/not-cesar-chavez-i-knew/
“BC’s new course on history of agricultural labor draws ire, discussion,” Bakersfield Californian, Nov 11 2022
https://www.bakersfield.com/news/bcs-new-course-on-history-of-agricultural-labor-draws-ire-discussion/article_6d079804-6225-11ed-b373-bbbb67368fb4.html
“Forgotten Hero of Labor Fight; His Son’s Lonely Quest” New York Times (2012)
