Classrooms in my elementary alma mater were arrayed with images reminding us of the divine sacrifices that had been made for our salvation. Typically, a cross of the crucified Christ held the position of honor, front and center, above bulletin board illustrations of the Palmer Method of cursive handwriting.
A picture of Jesus was also displayed. Halo aglow, his flaming heart visible outside his chest and garlanded in thorns, he accosted the viewer with intense, dark eyes as he pointed calmly at his glistening heart.
The only three-dimensional figure I recall in those hallowed rooms was a statue of Mary, mother of Jesus. She stood atop a globe, her palms outstretched in silent supplication, as she crushed a writhing, forked tongue serpent with startling white feet.
Jean-Francois Millet’s “The Gleaners” (Image courtesy Cleveland Museum of Art
Speaking for myself, these bewildering effigies inspired fear and confusion. What a relief in grade four to find a picture of “The Gleaners” on the wall by the coatroom. Jean-Francois Millet’s depiction of three peasant women picking up leftover shards of grain portrayed women hard at work. Their hands were probably rough and there was no glamour in their bent backs and clumsy feet, but they were heroic in their own way, gathering the leavings of a plentiful harvest to feed their families.
Millet created this masterpiece in 1857, less than ten years after the first phase of the French Revolution. Reportedly, the art was received with scorn and criticized for its depiction of rural poverty. One reviewer said, “These are homely scarecrows set up in a field: M. Millet’s ugliness and vulgarity have no relief.”
Writing on Labor Day drew me to Millet’s “Gleaners” and reminded me to check back on an exciting program called the Workers Writing Project. Originally the brainchild of the Association of Joint Labor-Management Educational Programs, the Writing Project promotes writing by workers as a path to lifelong learning.
In 2009, management of the project transitioned from the Association to the University of Massachusetts’ Partnership for Worker Education at Amherst. With support from the Nathan Cummings Foundation, the Workers Writing Project continues as a coalition of labor/management education programs that have designed, developed, and implemented a nationwide series of creative writing workshops for unionized workers.
The concept is simple: When workers are encouraged to write about work and what it is to be a working person, they develop confidence and cultivate a desire for learning that leads to the development of other skills that are useful in academics, job training, and for personal satisfaction and enrichment.
According to the website, hundreds of adult learners have participated in workshops that have produced a significant body of stories, poems, plays, films, and narratives. “Each piece expresses a singular view of the world as seen through workers’ eyes and as experienced through workers’ lives,” it claims.
“Contemporary American literature is rich with the contributions of formerly marginalized voices. Now, workers’ stories can join those of African-Americans, women, Latinos, immigrants, and add to the diverse tapestry of American writing.”
Further evidence of the curriculum’s success is that countless numbers of students have used the skills gained in these workshops to improve their performance and confidence on the job, enroll in academic programs, and take advantage of job-specific courses.
Lately, there is a shortage of people like the Gleaners, teetering on the bottom rung of an economy in which two jobs do not equal a living wage. They have no access to projects like the one at the University of Massachusetts/Amherst that recognizes the innate dignity of working people by offering them opportunities to participate in, and benefit from, lifelong learning.
Every Labor Day, we hear tributes to the American worker, but seldom do we hear real workers giving voice to their hopes and dreams or digging deep to examine the gulf between those who give orders and those who take them. On Labor Day 2021 take some time to ponder the work you do, why you do it, and how you feel about it.
That is what Gary Snyder did in his poem, “Hay for the Horses.”
“I’m sixty-eight” he said,
“I first bucked hay when I was seventeen.
I thought, that day I started,
I sure would hate to do this all my life.
And dammit, that’s just what
I’ve gone and done.”
