Cleaning Up
eBook - ePub

Cleaning Up

Portuguese Women's Fight for Labour Rights in Toronto

  1. 256 pages
  2. English
  3. ePUB (mobile friendly)
  4. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub

Cleaning Up

Portuguese Women's Fight for Labour Rights in Toronto

About this book

This fascinating book uncovers the little-known, surprisingly radical history of the Portuguese immigrant women who worked as night-time office cleaners and daytime "cleaning ladies" in postwar Toronto.

Drawing on union records, newspapers, and interviews, feminist labour historians Susana P. Miranda and Franca Iacovetta piece together the lives of immigrant women who bucked convention by reshaping domestic labour and by leading union drives, striking for workers' rights, and taking on corporate capital in the heart of Toronto's financial district. Despite being sidelined within the labour movement and subjected to harsh working conditions in the commercial cleaning industry, the women forged critical alliances with local activists to shape picket-line culture and make an indelible mark on their communities.

Richly detailed and engagingly written, Cleaning Up is an archival treasure about an undersung piece of working-class history in urban North America.

Frequently asked questions

Yes, you can cancel anytime from the Subscription tab in your account settings on the Perlego website. Your subscription will stay active until the end of your current billing period. Learn how to cancel your subscription.
At the moment all of our mobile-responsive ePub books are available to download via the app. Most of our PDFs are also available to download and we're working on making the final remaining ones downloadable now. Learn more here.
Perlego offers two plans: Essential and Complete
  • Essential is ideal for learners and professionals who enjoy exploring a wide range of subjects. Access the Essential Library with 800,000+ trusted titles and best-sellers across business, personal growth, and the humanities. Includes unlimited reading time and Standard Read Aloud voice.
  • Complete: Perfect for advanced learners and researchers needing full, unrestricted access. Unlock 1.4M+ books across hundreds of subjects, including academic and specialized titles. The Complete Plan also includes advanced features like Premium Read Aloud and Research Assistant.
Both plans are available with monthly, semester, or annual billing cycles.
We are an online textbook subscription service, where you can get access to an entire online library for less than the price of a single book per month. With over 1 million books across 1000+ topics, we’ve got you covered! Learn more here.
Look out for the read-aloud symbol on your next book to see if you can listen to it. The read-aloud tool reads text aloud for you, highlighting the text as it is being read. You can pause it, speed it up and slow it down. Learn more here.
Yes! You can use the Perlego app on both iOS or Android devices to read anytime, anywhere — even offline. Perfect for commutes or when you’re on the go.
Please note we cannot support devices running on iOS 13 and Android 7 or earlier. Learn more about using the app.
Yes, you can access Cleaning Up by Susana P. Miranda,Franca Iacovetta in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Social Sciences & Labour & Industrial Relations. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. Cover Page
  2. Praise for Cleaning Up
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright Page
  5. Dedication
  6. Contents
  7. List of Illustrations
  8. Acknowledgements
  9. Preface
  10. Chapter 1: “I have always worked”: Life in Portugal
  11. Chapter 2: Getting Settled
  12. Chapter 3: The Work of Cleaning, Workplace Control, and the Cleaner’s Body
  13. Chapter 4: Forging Alliances with Radical Community Workers in 1970s Toronto
  14. Chapter 5: Battling Corporate Giants: Union Activism in the 1970s
  15. Chapter 6: “We are women and immigrants but we can fight”: First Canadian Place Strike, 1984
  16. Chapter 7: Fighting Contracting Out in the Workplace and Political Arena
  17. Epilogue
  18. Notes
  19. Index