Silent No More: The Voice of a Farm Worker Press, 1964–1975
The dissertation critically examines the content of El Malcriado , a movement newspaper published by the Farm Worker Press in Delano, California between 1964 and 1975. El Malcriado resulted from the efforts of people attempting to create a cultural space to challenge and reconstruct the asymmetrical relations of power between farm workers and California agribusiness. Within the pages of the newspaper, its articles, cartoons, featured news stories, and editorials convey a narrative that points to the struggle of defining a farm worker position in opposition to the status quo of California agribusiness. A discourse content analysis of the newspaper between 1964 and 1975 reveals a process in which the collective energy of writers, artists, and contributors struggled to define a voice and to locate a cultural and social position within a violent and oppressive history of failed farmworker unionizing efforts. El Malcriado provides a historical window into the larger farm worker struggle of the 1960s and 1970s. More importantly, the newspaper offers a glimpse into the journalistic process of the creative minded people who attempted to shape the political consciousness of the times, in their efforts to transform the imposed conditions that defined the location of farmworkers of the period. Hence, this critical examination of El Malcriado reveals the means by which cultural processes were employed to cultivate workers' subjectivity and agency, within the context of the farm worker struggle, confirming the validity of the circuit of culture as a powerful explanatory paradigm.
Communication and the arts, Social sciences, Agribusiness, Farm worker press, Labor movement, Newspapers, American Studies, Journalism Studies, Labor Relations
Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations