Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In this exposé of workplace sexual violence against women, Yeung, a journalist from the Center for Investigative Reporting, amplifies the voices of some of the American economy's most marginalized workers. As in the companion radio and television series, Rape in the Fields, the book breaks ground by exposing the ubiquity and severity of the abuse leveled against female farmworkers, domestic workers, and janitors by their employers. The author mitigates the difficult material by bringing humanity, empathy, and hope to each page. There are plenty of heroes to celebrate, such as Vicky Márquez, a former janitor who now does site visits for a nonprofit with the mission "of fighting labor exploitation among janitors working the graveyard shift," and the women who testified against Evans Fruit for overlooking information that their orchard foreman was sexually harassing female farmworkers. Moments of indignation in Yeung's writing feel completely justifiable. "Though these cases are described as he-said, she-said cases, the woman's account is seldom given equal consideration," she notes. The book concludes with guardedly hopeful descriptions of workplace training programs, government regulation, and union advocacy. Even more moving, however, is the sense of a reporter deeply committed to her sources and her material. (Mar.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Review by Library Journal Review
Yeung (Ctr. for Investigative Reporting) draws on years of investigative reporting by multiple journalists to document the systemic sexual violence endured by women, many of them undocumented immigrants of color, in some of America's most low-paying, unregulated industries. She focuses on the experience of female workers in farm, janitorial, and domestic service industries, all three of which have structural conditions making them ripe for exploitation of workers. Yeung weaves together stories of women workers and activists-often former industry workers themselves-who are making change. For example, one chapter focuses on the work of Vicki Márquez at the Maintenance Corporation Trust Fund, a nonprofit in California seeking to end exploitation in the janitorial field; another centers on the story of domestic worker June Barrett and efforts to pass legislation regulating an industry largely exempt from federal labor laws. Readers who have worked in these industries, who have been or are undocumented or dependent on abusers for income will no doubt recognize their own experience in the cases Yeung profiles. Verdict In clear and compelling prose, Yeung reminds us how pervasive sexualized violence is in low-wage work and how urgent the need for both regulatory and cultural change.-Anna J. Clutterbuck-Cook, Massachusetts Historical Soc., Boston © Copyright 2018. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
An investigative report exposes rampant workplace sexual abuse against female immigrant workers.Yeung shares the illuminating and often shocking stories of harassment against low-wage, at-risk workers deemed vulnerable due to the nature of their immigration status and their dependence on their employment in order to support a family. Based on three years of reportage through her work with the Center for Investigative Reporting team, the author documents and updates several case studies of workplace abuse against domestic workers. During her research, Yeung accompanied an undercover investigator checking in with night-shift janitors embroiled in a "black vortex" of rampant abuse and unaccountability due to the silencing of those terrified of termination or worse. She met farmworkers, domestic help, and hotel and janitorial workers, many of whom shared stories of sexual assault and personal threats. These compelling examples of exploitation and dehumanization represent a pattern of abuse and a silent epidemic affecting (mainly) female immigrant workers across the country. The author notes how many are motivated by fear and a hostile anti-immigrant political climate to reluctantly accept the "open secret" of their fate as abused employees: "The combination of undocumented immigration status and worries about losing a job serve as a powerful muzzle." Yeung also spotlights a wave of recent protective legislation and lawsuits brought against companies who are aware of the allegations against them yet choose to remain neutral and of the serpentine legal strategies involved in sexual harassment cases. These statistics alone point to an epidemic problem in dire need of outside intervention. In continuing to expose these atrocities, Yeung and those like her hope to call much-needed attention to the toxic environment these underserved workers are subjected to and bring about an end to their maltreatment. A hopeful chapter on the inroads made toward training workers on how to identify and report workplace violence signals a new understanding and valuing of domestic employment.A timely, intensely intimate, and relevant expos on a greatly disregarded sector of the American workforce. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
