African Americans and The Labor Movement: A Conversation with Teri Lassiter

This year’s Black History Month theme, African Americans and Labor, explores the significant role of Black labor throughout history—spanning from enslaved Africans’ forced agricultural work to the organized labor movements fighting for justice and economic equity.

To commemorate Black History Month and deepen our understanding of this theme, we sat down with Teri Lassiter, Assistant Dean for Justice, Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion for Education and an assistant professor in the Department of Urban-Global Public Health at the Rutgers School of Public Health, to discuss the historical and modern implications of Black labor, its connection to social justice, and the lessons we must take forward.

---

Can you explain the central idea behind this year’s Black History Month theme, African Americans and Labor?

The 2025 Black History Month theme, African Americans and Labor, focuses on the various and profound ways that work and working of all kinds – free and unfree, skilled and unskilled, vocational and voluntary – intersect with the collective experiences of Black people. Indeed, work is at the center of much of Black history and culture.

Be it the traditional agricultural labor of enslaved Africans that fed Low Country colonies, debates among Black educators on the importance of vocational training, self-help strategies, and entrepreneurship in Black communities, or organized labor’s role in fighting both economic and social injustice, Black people’s work has been transformational throughout the U.S., Africa, and the Diaspora. The 2025 Black History Month theme, African Americans and Labor, sets out to highlight and celebrate the potent impact of this work.

How does labor relate to the broader understanding of Black culture and history?

Examining the work of Black people from various perspectives allows for a deeper understanding of Black life and culture across time and space. In this context, "work" not only refers to compensated labor in factories, the military, government agencies, office buildings, public services, and private homes but also includes the efforts of social justice activists, volunteers serving their communities, and the development of institutions within churches, community groups, and social clubs.

In each of these contexts, Black individuals' contributions have played a crucial role in shaping their lives, cultures, histories, and societies. Understanding Black labor and its impact across these varied settings is essential for grasping Black people's experiences, histories, and cultures.

Can you speak to the historical background of the exploitation of Black labor during slavery and its impact on the future of Black workers?

Africans were brought to the Americas and enslaved for their knowledge and ability to serve as a workforce, which was heavily exploited by various European countries and later by the United States government. During this period of enslavement, Black people labored primarily for others; however, some were quasi-free and worked for themselves, all while living in a country that did not value Black life.

After fighting for their freedom during the Civil War and navigating the country's shift from an agricultural economy to an industrial one, African Americans became sharecroppers, farm laborers, landowners, and wage earners. Furthermore, the contributions of African Americans to the built landscape can be seen throughout the nation, as they constructed and designed many of the most iconic examples of architectural heritage, particularly in the South.

How have Black workers and professionals responded to labor exploitation and discrimination?

Over the years, in response to the super-exploitation of Black labor, wage disparities, and employment discrimination based on race, sex, and gender, Black professionals—including teachers, nurses, musicians, and lawyers—have organized for better working conditions and compensation. Workers in various occupations, such as steelworkers, washerwomen, dock workers, and sex workers, as well as those in sports, arts, and sciences, have also joined these efforts.

Notably, Black women like Addie Wyatt became involved in union work and leadership, advocating for job security, reproductive rights, and wage increases.

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters and Maids, founded by labor organizer and civil rights activist A. Philip Randolph. This was the first Black union to receive a charter from the American Federation of Labor. Martin Luther King Jr. incorporated issues highlighted by Randolph’s March on Washington Movement, such as economic justice, into the Poor People’s Campaign, which he established in 1967. For King, it was essential for Black people to be recognized as full citizens.

What broader reflections can be drawn from the theme African Americans and Labor?

The theme, African Americans and Labor, aims to foster reflections on the connections between the work of Black individuals and their workplaces, considering various aspects and significant moments in Black history and culture across different and locations, including the U.S., Africa, and the Diaspora. Like religion, social justice movements, and education, the study of African American labor and labor struggles is an essential focus for developing new interpretations and reinterpreting the Black experience—past, present, and future. These new perspectives are especially vital as the historical forces of racial oppression regain strength in the 21st century.

What resources would you recommend for individuals to further explore the topic of Black labor and its historical significance?

Books

• Climbing the Rough Side of the Mountain: The Extraordinary Story of Love, Civil Rights, and Labor Activism | Norman Hill and Velma Murphy Hill (2023)
• Building a Latino Civil Rights Movement: Puerto Ricans, African Americans, and the Pursuit of Racial Justice in New York City | Sonia Song-Ha Lee (2016)
• Household Workers Unite: The Untold Story of African American Women Who Built a Movement | Premilla Nadasen (2016)
• There's Always Work at the Post Office: African American Postal Workers and the Fight for Jobs, Justice, and Equality | Phillip F. Rubio (2010)
• Rising from the Rails: Pullman Porters and the Making of the Black Middle Class | Larry Tye (2005)

Videos

• The March on Washington | Smithsonian Education
• African Americans’ Struggle for Full Rights in the U.S. Labor Movement | Rutgers School of Management and Labor Relations
• From Secret Trade Societies to Clubs: Early Black Women’s Labor Organizing Outside of Labor Unions | Rutgers School of Management and Labor Relations
• A Democracy Cannot Exist Without Labor Unions: Paul Robeson and the Labor Movement | Rutgers School of Management and Labor Relations
• Honoring Martin Luther King & the Labor Movement | Central Midwest Carpenters
• Pullman and the Railroad Rebellion — A Chicago Stories Documentary | WTTW

Movie

Rustin | Netflix (2023)

The movie is based on the true story of Bayard Rustin, who helped Martin Luther King Jr. and others organize the 1963 March on Washington (the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom). As an advisor to Martin Luther King Jr., he dedicated his life to the quest for racial equality, human rights, and worldwide democracy. However, as an openly gay Black man, he is all but erased from the civil rights movement he helped build.