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Selina Todd
dangerously , this public memory suggests that being working-class is a lifestyle that has now been lost through the greed and selfishness of workingclass people themselves . In fact , as the American writer Walter Benn Michaels has pointed out , class is a product of economic and political inequality . Celebrating or mourning an ‘ authentic ’, depoliticised working class simply leaves us with a status quo that condemns a majority of people to worse health and shorter lifespans than those at the top of the pile .
The popular memory of the working-class has long been more political , and less parochial , than the public memory . In the 1970s and 1980s , Britain had a flourishing community publishing scene , and state schools also encouraged children to undertake project work in their neighbourhoods . These initiatives produced hundreds of working-class autobiographies and oral histories which show how memories of strikes and resistance shaped the lives not just of protestors , but of their children . These provide excellent resources for the study of popular memory . Some state schools trained children in undertaking oral history interviews – I was fortunate to be among them , and it ’ s a skill I have used in my career as a historian .
Autobiographies and oral histories remind us that until 1939 , the largest single group of working people in Britain were servants , not miners or steelworkers . The typical servant was a teenage girl , often a migrant . 21st century migrant care workers and call centre staff have more connections to the
past than we might assume – and those links might help us explain why unionisation has risen among part-time , women workers since 2000 .
These memories can change our understanding of working-class history . They also reveal the importance of memory itself , as a tool with which to question oppression . In 1926 , a General Strike occurred in Britain : millions of workers downed tools . But the Strike was a failure for the labour movement . The trade union leadership capitulated after just nine days and Britain ’ s miners – who had instigated the dispute – were locked out of work for months . But the autobiographies of former servants shows that the memory of the strike , the possibilities it suggested , and a desire to carry on their fathers ’ struggle , led many young women to question their own subordinate position . As factory work increased in the late 1930s , servants who were the daughters of miners and steelworkers led an exodus from domestic service , and began to unionise in the factories . In 1945 , they were among those voters who gave Labour a landslide election victory , swept to power by promises to establish a welfare state and full employment .
After 1945 , the welfare state depended heavily on migrant workers , especially women , as nurses , teachers , cleaners and care workers . As the Black British journalist Gary Younge wrote earlier this year , we badly need to reclaim this memory as part of working-class history . Many aspects of modern history that evoke pride in Britain ( especially the establishment of the National Health Service in 1948 ) relied on women and migrants .
Of course such memories can become romanticised . Younge reminds us not to forget the racism his family faced and the sexism that prevented so many women of his mother ’ s generation from fulfilling their potential . In the 1970s , working-class women ( Black as well as white ) organised as trade unionists and parents to create a new women ’ s movement , provoked by anger at the sexism they encountered from male trade unionists and activists , as well as from the state . Researchers need to learn to ask the right questions to tap into these memories . If we miss them , we may imply
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Observing Memories ISSUE 4