Kids at Work

Emir Estrada is Associate Professor of Sociology at Arizona State University. She is the author of Kids at Work: Latinx Families Selling Food on the Streets of Los Angeles, Winner of the 2020 Outstanding Scholarly Contribution Award, given by the Children and Youth Section of the American Sociological Association.

Emir Estradas insightful ethnography reveals the complexity of the household economy of undocumented and mixed-status families in Los Angeles, from the standpoint of children who work as street vendors. Kids at Work forces a reconsideration of traditional notions of childhood, family relations, and work, by demonstrating how children with their own agency and decision-making capacity enter into mutually supportive and protective family and work arrangements with their parents to make ends meet. In the context of a highly-stratified economy and society, where race, illegality, class, and gender intersect to shape unequal life chances, Estradas ground-breaking book uncovers the central and indispensable role that children play as co-contributors to the household economy of our most vulnerable families. - Zulema Valdez, author of Entrepreneurs and the Search for the American Dream Estrada balances methodological rigor with great empathylikely partially rooted in her own experiences as a teen vendorto develop a deeply insightful and nuanced analysis of the lives of immigrant children street vendors in Los Angeles. Written clearly and accessibly, the book reveals the structural context in which vending becomes necessary, while underscoring the childrens agency that allows them to find meaning in the work they do to help support their families and their own aspirations. Kids at Work will make readers not only notice, but also appreciate youth whose public labor challenges social notions of childhood in powerfully gendered and racialized ways. - Leisy J. Abrego, author of Sacrificing Families: Navigating Laws, Labor, and Love Across Borders This original, thoughtful, engaging ethnography vividly captures the texture of everyday life among immigrant children and children of immigrants who work selling food in the streets of Los Angeles. In the childrens own voices, we learn about their economic contributions, their lives, and aspirations, but also from them about immigrant entrepreneurship, the complex dynamics in immigrant families, and childhood in general. Kids at Work resists facile explanations and makes an enduring contribution to the immigration scholarship. Indispensable reading for anyone interested in immigrant families. - Cecilia Menjívar, co-author of Immigrant Families Kids at Work sheds new light on the role that children and youth play in family survival strategies in the urban commons of one of the most important immigrant metropolis of our era. This book brilliantly shows the agency of these young women and men who actively contribute to the well-being of their families. Emir Estrada has made a unique contribution to the sociology of children of immigrants, studying their lives as they work alongside their parents on the streets of Los Angeles. - Ruben Hernandez-Leon, author of Metropolitan Migrants: The Migration of Urban Mexicans to the United States Written clearly and accessibly, this book offers an essential framework from which to critically examine Latinx childhood, family, labor, immigration, and community. (Choice) Like many well-crafted stories, Kids at Work left me genuinely curious about what will happen next for the working kids on these pages as they transition into working young adults. Will street vending be a crucial stepping-stone on a longer pathway to better quality employment, or could it be an impediment? Estrada invites these types of questions through her portrayal of the Latinx street vending families that is both meticulously detailed and fully compassionate. This book stands as an important contribution to the literature on immigration and work in the United States precisely because it highlights the fact that informal work represents an intergenerational activity for many immigrant Latinx families. (American Journal of Sociology)