Historian Jana K. Lipman of Tulane is the co-winner of the Taft Labor History Prize for her book, Guantánamo: A Working-Class History Between Empire and Revolution.
Lipman, assistant professor in the Tulane history department, received the national award along with Thavolia Glymph of Duke University, chosen for the book, Out of the House of Bondage: The Transformation of the Plantation Household.
The Taft Labor History Prize Committee announced the winners of the 2009 prize for the best book in labor and working-class history published in 2008.
Lipman’s book, published by the University of California Press, examines how U. S. labor practices in a military outpost maintained neocolonialism. Foregrounding the women and men who lived and worked under the empire, Lipman demonstrates the importance of a transnational perspective and opens a window to a virtually unknown chapter of labor history.
This year the Taft Prize comes with a cash award of $1,000 for each winner. It is administered by the ILR School at Cornell University in collaboration with the Labor and Working Class History Association.