Mujeres Trabajadoras: An Intersectional Perspective on Inequalities in the Working Conditions and Lives of Mexicana Farmworkers in the San Joaquin Valley

This qualitative study uses a feminist intersectional perspective to examine how the lives and working conditions of Mexican women farmworkers are shaped by inequalities that are exacerbated by the historic California drought (2011-2016). This study centers on the lives of Mexicana farmworkers in the San Joaquin Valley, a community that is bound together by a shared history, but that exhibits an incredible amount of diversity and difference. Although many women farmworkers face multiple axes of oppression based on their race, class, gender, and citizenship status, the inequalities they face are not only in relation to the dominant power structures that undergird the corporations that employ them. Instead, this work seeks to understand the inequalities that exist within the group in order to shed light on how larger structural forces interact with the lived experiences of one of the most disenfranchised populations