Made famous in the 1976 documentary Harlan County USA, this pocket
of Appalachian coal country has been home to generations of
miners-and to some of the most bitter labor battles of the 20th
century. It has also produced a rich tradition of protest songs and
a wealth of fascinating culture and custom that has remained
largely undiscovered by outsiders, until now. They Say in Harlan
County is not a book about coal miners so much as a dialogue in
which more than 150 Harlan County women and men tell the story of
their region, from pioneer times through the dramatic strikes of
the 1930s and '70s, up to the present. Alessandro Portelli draws on
25 years of original interviews to take readers into the mines and
inside the lives of those who work, suffer, and often die in
them-from black lung, falling rock, suffocation, or simply from
work that can be literally backbreaking. The book is structured as
a vivid montage of all these voices-stoic, outraged,
grief-stricken, defiant-skillfully interwoven with documents from
archives, newspapers, literary works, and the author's own
participating and critical voice. Portelli uncovers the whole
history and memory of the United States in this one symbolic place,
through settlement, civil war, slavery, industrialization,
immigration, labor conflict, technological change, migration, strip
mining, environmental and social crises, and resistance. And as
hot-button issues like mountain-top removal and the use of "clean
coal" continue to hit the news, the history of Harlan
County-especially as seen through the eyes of those who lived it-is
becoming increasingly important. With rare emotional immediacy,
gripping narratives, and unforgettable characters, They Say in
Harlan County tells the real story of a culture, the resilience of
its people, and the human costs of coal mining.
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