HSTAA 274 / LABOR 274: Seattle Labor History
University of Washington
Winter 2026
Instructor: Andrew Hedden, heddena@uw.edu (He/Him)
Class Meetings: Tuesday/Thursday, 10:30 AM - 12:20 PM in Mary Gates Hall, Room 082A
Office Hours: Tuesday, 1:30 PM – 3:30 PM, or by appointment, in Smith Hall, Room 017, Harry Bridges Center Office (located in the basement, one floor below our classroom)
>> Download Syllabus as a PDF here
>> View Course Schedule as Modules here
Course Description
From the world famous General Strike of 1919 to the WTO protests of 1999, the city of Seattle has a renowned labor history. This class will go beyond the big events and headlines to understand how diverse communities of working people are central to the city’s past and present.
Beginning with the establishment of capitalism and wage labor on the traditional lands of the Duwamish people in the mid-19th century, through the rise of Boeing, Microsoft, and Amazon in the 20th century, the class will explore the role of work in Seattle’s shifting roles in the political economy of the region and the world. From agriculture to aerospace, sex work to high technology, we will explore how labor has been constituted by divisions of empire, class, race, gender, and other forms of power that are organized globally but manifest locally.
The course will also look at how workers have organized collectively to reproduce and contest these divisions, such as through the white supremacist Workingmens’ Party, the radical Industrial Workers of the World, the anti-imperialist International Longshore and Warehouse Union, and the intersectional Welfare Rights Organization. In doing so, we will gain insight into how past workers’ struggles over power shape wealth inequalities and political movements in Seattle today.
Readings
Our main text book is Seattle from the Margins: Exclusion, Erasure, and the Making of a Pacific Coast City by Megan Asaka (University of Washington Press, 2022). In addition, we will read a number of book chapters and essays on particular topics that will be provided electronically on Canvas.
It is critical that you complete the assigned reading prior to each class to prepare you for class discussion and lecture. In class, you are expected to know the content of the reading and its argument, and to be ready to share questions and reflections that the reading prompted for you.
Assignments and Grading
Grades will be determined by class participation, weekly written reflections, midterm and final exams, and a final research paper. They will be weighted as follows:
- Class participation, 10%
- Ten weekly reflections (complete/incomplete), 10%
- Midterm exam: In class, reviewing readings and class material, 20%
- Final research paper: Topic proposal, 5%
- Final research paper: Primary source assignment, 5%
- Final research paper: Outline, 5%
- Final research paper: Introductory paragraph, 5%
- Final research paper “lightning” talk, 5%
- Final research paper, 15%
- Final exam: In class, reviewing readings and class material, 20%
The exams will be a combination of essay questions and short answers assessing your knowledge of the concepts and topics covered in the class. The exams will be written and conducted in class. Additional guidelines and study guides will be provided.
You will learn how to research and write an original 2,500-word paper on a topic related to Seattle labor history. To aid in your progress, the final paper is broken up into separate assignments over the last half of the quarter. Further details will be provided for each of these assignments.
Course Policies
Access and Accommodations
Your experience in this class is important to me. If you have already established accommodations with Disability Resources for Students (DRS), please communicate your approved accommodations to me at your earliest convenience so we can discuss your needs in this course.
If you have not yet established services through DRS, but have a temporary health condition or permanent disability that requires accommodations (conditions include but not limited to; mental health, attention-related, learning, vision, hearing, physical or health impacts), you are welcome to contact DRS at 206-543-8924 or uwdrs@uw.edu or disability.uw.edu. DRS offers resources and coordinates reasonable accommodations for students with disabilities and/or temporary health conditions. Reasonable accommodations are established through an interactive process between you, your instructor(s) and DRS. It is the policy and practice of the University of Washington to create inclusive and accessible learning environments consistent with federal and state law.
Religious Accommodations
Washington state law requires that UW develop a policy for accommodation of student absences or significant hardship due to reasons of faith or conscience, or for organized religious activities. The UW’s policy, including more information about how to request an accommodation, is available at Religious Accommodations Policy (https://registrar.washington.edu/staffandfaculty/religious-accommodations-policy/ ). Accommodations must be requested within the first two weeks of this course using the Religious Accommodations Request form (https://registrar.washington.edu/students/religious-accommodations-request/ ).
Plagiarism and AI Tools
Academic dishonesty will result in a failing grade for the course. Academic dishonesty is defined as cheating, plagiarism, unauthorized collaboration, falsifying academic records, and any other act designed to avoid participating honestly in the learning process. Academic dishonesty also includes, but is not limited to, providing false or misleading information to receive a postponement or extension on a test or assignment, or the submission of essentially the same written assignment for two different courses without prior permission of the instructors.
The unauthorized use of artificial intelligence (AI) is a form of academic misconduct at UW. Tools that use AI and large language models to generate text—such as ChatGPT, GPT4, Bing Chat, and “Write with AI” in Google Docs—are prohibited in this course. The use of such tools to complete your assignments constitutes academic misconduct according to UW policy and may result in serious disciplinary action.
Beyond a form of misconduct, AI is fraught with ethical and practical problems. AI systems are built on the stolen labor of writers, publishers, and scholars. Seemingly automatic “machine learning” is highly dependent upon invisible pools of precarious workers located predominately in the Global South. The enormous amounts of electricity required for AI computer processing, moreover, are highly destructive of the environment.
In practice, generative AI produces material that is difficult or impossible to source, often outright fabricating information. Using AI dampens our abilities to think critically for ourselves, organize information, and construct an effective argument. Aesthetically, AI generates writing that is flat and without character. You can and will do better writing for yourself!
Resources
Harry Bridges Center for Labor Studies/Labor Studies Minor
This class is made possible by the support of the Harry Bridges Center for Labor Studies. Through education and research, the Bridges Center’s mission is to develop labor studies, broadly conceived to include working people everywhere, as a central concern in higher education.
Throughout the quarter and beyond, I encourage you to learn more about the Bridges Center’s programs. Through courses, scholarships, internships, events, and more, the Harry Bridges Center provides students with the knowledge, skills, and experience they need to advocate for themselves as workers. To sign up for Bridges Center email announcements, visit https://labor.washington.edu/contact
The Labor Studies Minor, managed by the Bridges Center, allows students to incorporate workers’ issues into their broader fields of study. HSTAA 274 / LABOR 274 - Seattle Labor History is currently in the process of being designated a foundational course for the Minor. Contact the Bridges Center to have the course approved for your Minor at hbcls@uw.edu. To learn more about the Minor’s requirements, visit https://labor.washington.edu/labor-studies-minor
Labor Archives of Washington
The Labor Archives of Washington was founded in 2008 by the Harry Bridges Center for Labor Studies and the University of Washington Libraries. The Labor Archives houses over 350 collections of labor-related materials from individuals and organizations, preserving the history of working people in the Pacific Northwest. For more information, visit https://www.laborarchives.org
Student Resources in Times of Need
The UW Department of History has collected a list of helpful resources for students experiencing financial or emotional hardship. These resources include financial support (e.g. loans, insurance, and emergency funding), safety and legal resources (e.g. violence prevention and civil rights), and mental health resources. For a full list, visit https://history.washington.edu/student-resources-times-need
COURSE SCHEDULE
WEEK ONE
Tuesday, January 6: What is Seattle Labor History?
Thursday, January 8: The Colonial Roots of Racial Capitalism
- READ TEXTBOOK: Megan Asaka, Seattle from the Margins, Acknowledgements, Introduction, and Chapter 1, “The Sawdust”
WEEK TWO
Tuesday, January 13: “Devil’s Playground:” Labor Power and Violence in the Puget Sound Hop Fields
- READ TEXTBOOK: Asaka, Seattle from the Margins, Chapter 2, “Urban Roots of Puget Sound Agriculture”
Thursday, January 15: Worker Radicalism in the White Man’s Promised Land: Anti-Asian Racism, the Knights of Labor, and the Industrial Workers of the World
- READ TEXTBOOK: Asaka, Seattle from the Margins, Chapter 3, “Race, Radicals, and Timber”
WEEK THREE
Tuesday, January 20: Revolution in Seattle? The 1919 General Strike
- READ ON CANVAS: Dana Frank, Purchasing Power: Consumer Organizing, Gender, and the Seattle Labor Movement, 1919-1929, “Solidarity”
- READ ONLINE: Choose one essay from the Seattle General Strike Project, https://depts.washington.edu/labhist/strike/researchpapers.shtml
Thursday, January 22: City on the Skids: Survival Strategies of the Great Depression
- READ TEXTBOOK: Asaka, Seattle from the Margins, Chapter 4, “Japanese Hotels and Housing Reform,” and Chapter 5, “Labor, Intimacy, and the Depression”
WEEK FOUR
Tuesday, January 27: Racial Capitalism Preserved: The New Deal in Seattle
- READ TEXTBOOK: Asaka, Seattle from the Margins, Chapter 6, “Demolition on the Eve of War,” and Conclusion, “Displacement and Exclusion, Past and Present”
Thursday, January 29: The Political Economy of the Nuclear Family
WEEK FIVE
Tuesday, February 3: Seattle’s Most Famous (and Forgotten) Labor Boss
- READ ON CANVAS: Murray Morgan, Skid Road: An Informal Portrait of Seattle, “Dave Beck: Labor and Politics, 1918-1960”
- SUBMIT: Special Collections Materials Request
Thursday, February 5: Midterm Exam
WEEK SIX
Tuesday, February 10: Jim Crow Unionism and the Golden Age of Capitalism
- READ ON CANVAS: Trevor Griffey, “Making Racial Skills: Non-Discrimination Law and the Segregation of Skilled Labor in Seattle Industry, 1940s-1960s”
- CLASS VISIT TO UW SPECIAL COLLECTIONS
Thursday, February 12: The Rise and Fall of the Labor Left
- READ ON CANVAS: Gigi Peterson, “Recobrando / Recovering The Struggle Against Racial Discrimination: The Journey of the Pablo O’Higgins Mural for the Seattle Ship Scalers Union”
- GUEST SPEAKER: Aubrey Williams, UW Open Scholarship and Digital History Librarian
- ASSIGNMENT DUE: Final Research Paper Topic Proposal
WEEK SEVEN
Tuesday, February 17: Motherhood is Powerful: The Welfare Rights Movement and the “Boeing Bust”
Thursday, February 19: The Most Unlivable City: Surviving Gentrification in 1980s Seattle
- READ ON CANVAS: James Lyons, Selling Seattle: Representing Contemporary Urban America, “Seattle: Rated Suitable for All the Family”
- IN-CLASS FILM: Streetwise (1983)
- ASSIGNMENT DUE: Primary Source Analysis
WEEK EIGHT
Tuesday, February 24: The Invisible Labor of High Technology
- READ ON CANVAS: David Kusnet, selections from Love the Work, Hate the Job
Thursday, February 26: Five Days that Shook the World: 1999 Seattle WTO Protests
- READ ON CANVAS: Kristin Wong, “Shutting Us Out: Race, Class and the Framing of A Movement”
- IN-CLASS FILM: This Is What Democracy Looks Like (1983)
- ASSIGNMENT DUE: Final Paper Outline
WEEK NINE
Tuesday, March 3: Labor and the Rise of the Care Economy
- READ ONLINE: JOMO, “Caring on Stolen Time: A Nursing Home Diary”
- GUEST SPEAKER: JM Wong, Massage Parlor Organizing Project/Puget Sound Sage
Thursday, March 5: Review & Seattle Labor Movement Today
- READING TO BE ANNOUNCED
- ASSIGNMENT DUE: Final Paper Introductory Paragraph
WEEK TEN
Tuesday, March 10: Research Paper Presentations
- ASSIGNMENT DUE: "Lightning Talk" Google Slide
Thursday, March 12: Research Paper Presentations
- ASSIGNMENT DUE: Final Research Paper
FINALS WEEK
Monday, March 16: Final Exam
- 10:30 AM - 12:20 PM in our regular classroom, Mary Gates Hall (MGH) 082