Invisible Workers of the U.S.–Mexico Bracero Program

Ronald L. Mize is associate professor in the School of Language, Culture, and Society at Oregon State University.

Invisible Workers gives voice to the Braceros, whose perspectives have been largely absent from official accounts.... Mize’s writing sheds light on the institutional racism that was woven into the Bracero program’s structure, but also into interpersonal relationships.... Mize gives historical context to a longstanding bipolar relationship in which the United States entices documented and undocumented labor to cross the border to do dangerous, backbreaking, dirty, low-paying jobs and then turns on the Mexicans, making them the face of the law-breakers who must be deported for not standing in line to enter and stay legally.... The author deserves high praise for opening eyes to a program in which the United States asked Mexico to send field workers for almost 25 years.

• Chapter 1: The Invisible Workers of the U.S.–Mexican Bracero ProgramChapter 2: Braceros and the Social Formation of Anglo Racial FramesChapter 3: The Bracero Working Day and the Contested Terrain of Class RelationsChapter 4: The Making of the Bracero ‘Total’ InstitutionChapter 5: Conclusion: The Politics of Reparations and the Contemporary Bracero Redress MovementAppendix I: The Articulation of Race and Class in the Making of the Bracero Total InstitutionAppendix II: Working in the Field: Historical Memory, Archival Ethnography, and Direct Accounts of Agricultural Migrant LaborAppendix III: The Standard Work Contract and Accompanying DocumentsAppendix IV: Original Bracero Agreement of 1942Appendix V: Braceros from Mexican States of Origin, 1942–1946 and 1951–1964