PROPOSAL TYPE
Roundtable
SEEKING
- Seeking Additional Presenters
- Seeking General Feedback and Interest
RELATED TOPICS
- Labor and Economy
- Museums/Exhibits
- Social Justice
ABSTRACT
This roundtable brings together practitioners and researchers immersed in contemporary labor organizing activities in the creative industries in the US and Canada, including art museums, the public history sector, digital media, libraries, and more. The ultimate aim of the roundtable is to connect activists, workers, organizers, and academics, foster opportunities to build solidarity, and support future organizing across professional and social divides to build a stronger working class.
DESCRIPTION
The creative industries have seen a wave of labor organizing in the past decade. Workers in these sectors are collectively pushing back against unjust workplace norms, growing precarity, and passion exploitation. Recent labor organizing drives gained momentum following the COVID-19 pandemic and global uprisings for racial justice.
The proposed roundtable would bring together practitioners and researchers immersed in contemporary labor organizing in the creative industries in the US and Canada. Participants will share brief reports on labor organizing in their respective industries, and would then engage in dialogue around the following questions:
- What are the common threads through these campaigns?
- In what ways are these movements distinct from one another?
- How do the experiences of organizing and solidarity manifest and shape our work?
- What does organizing in this sector look like beyond formal labor unions?
- How are researchers and other cultural workers archiving contemporary labor organizing activity?
- What questions does this discussion raise for the future of our fields? How are we teaching about our fields to emerging professionals?
- In what ways and to what ends can we build cross-sector solidarity?
- What does an organized “creative class” look like – what can we achieve together
The final section of the roundtable would open up the discussion to questions from audience members. If, as organizers Leah Hunt-Hendrix and Astra Taylor (2024) assert, “solidarity requires intentional cultivation; it is not a spontaneous phenomenon” (p. xiv), this roundtable constitutes the intentional cultivation of solidarity. The ultimate goal is to connect workers, organizers, and academics, foster opportunities to identify common ground, and support future organizing across professional and social divides to build a stronger working class.
Panelists include:
- Art Museums: Amanda Tobin Ripley (confirmed) and Liz Levine, Museums Moving Forward (pending)
- Digital Media: Greig de Peuter and Nicole Cohen (confirmed)
- *Public History: a representative from the NCPH Labor Task Force (pending); Haley Bryant, President Lincoln’s Cottage Museum (confirmed)
- *Libraries and Archives: Meredith Kahn, University of Michigan (pending); a representative from the Newberry Library (pending)
- *Video games: Carolyn Jong, Game Workers Unite (pending)
- *Science museums/aquariums/zoos
*in need of assistance in identifying additional potential panelists
If you have a direct offer of assistance, sensitive criticism, or wish to pass along someone’s contact information confidentially, please get in contact directly: Amanda Ripley, [email protected]
ALL FEEDBACK AND OFFERS OF ASSISTANCE SHOULD BE SUBMITTED BY JULY 10, 2024. If you have general ideas or feedback to share, please feel free to use the comments feature below.