“Oaxacans Like to Work Bent Over”: The Naturalization of Social Suffering among Berry Farm Workers
| Author | Seth M. Holmes |
| Published date | 01 August 2007 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2435.2007.00410.x |
| Date | 01 August 2007 |
Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd.,
9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK, and
350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.
© 2007 The Author
Journal Compilation © 2007 IOM
International Migration Vol. 45 (3) 2007
ISSN 0020-7985
* Resident, Physician Scientist Pathway, Internal Medicine and Anthropology, University of
Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Article awarded 2006 Rudolf Virchow Award from the Critical Anthropology of Health
Caucus of the Society for Medical Anthropology
“Oaxacans Like to Work Bent Over”:
The Naturalization of Social
Suffering among Berry
Farm Workers
Seth M. Holmes*
The skagiT valley
The Skagit River ows west from the mountains of the North Cascades National
Park in northwestern Washington State to the Pacic Ocean’s Puget Sound, pour-
ing through some of the most spectacular vistas in North America. The river is
located roughly halfway between Seattle, Washington and Vancouver, British
Columbia, about an hour and a half drive from each. Most of Skagit County’s
agriculture can be found in the at ood plain of the river. This land is protected
from the tides of the Puget Sound by a grass-covered dike some ve-feet tall
gently curving along the edge of the water.
The valley includes several towns lining Interstate-5, with charming turn-of-
the-century town centres surrounded by expanding strip malls, apartment build-
ings, and housing developments. Much of the land now covered by strip malls
was ower or berry elds a mere ve to ten years ago. In the valley, one hears
heartrending stories related to the state of family farming in the United States
– the Johnson dairy farm closing after several generations because they could
not compete with large agribusiness; the Thompson berry farm shutting down
after nearly a century due to increasing competition from abroad; and Mister
Christenson’s shame at selling his apple orchard to the developers of a new mega-
store, ending the Christenson apple growing legacy that had endured since their
40 Holmes
© 2007 The Author
Journal Compilation © 2007 IOM
arrival from Scandinavia. A common bumper sticker in the valley rails against
this phenomenon: “Save Skagit Farmland, Pavement is Forever”. Several family
farms, relatively small in comparison with much of US agribusiness, cultivate
the remaining agricultural land.
hiDDeNNess OF MigRaNT BODies
There are no migrants here; why are you looking here? I haven’t heard of any. If
you want migrants, you’ll have to go to the other side of the mountains, Eastern
Washington. There are lots who pick apples around Yakima, I think. But there
aren’t any over here.
A regional public health ofcer in Washington State advised me thus in the fall of
2002 as I explored the possibilities of dissertation eldwork with undocumented
indigenous Mexicans in Skagit County.
As I came to discover over the next two years, the Skagit Valley is an impor-
tant site in multiple transnational circuits (see Rouse, 2002) of Mexican farm
labourers, including indigenous Mixteco and Triqui people from the Mexican
state of Oaxaca. A few thousand arrive here for the tulip-cutting and berry-pick-
ing seasons in the spring and live several months in shacks made of cardboard,
plastic sheets, and broken-down cars or in company-owned labour camps, often
in close proximity to the multi-level houses of local elites with panoramic views
of the valley. The migrant labour camps look like chains of rusted tin-roofed
tool sheds lined up within a few feet of each other and have been mistaken for
small chicken coops in long rows. The plywood walls are semi-covered by peel-
ing brown-pink paint. There is no insulation and the wind often blows through
holes and cracks in the walls. Each unit has two small windows, some of which
are broken and many of which are covered by old cardboard boxes. The ground
around the camps quickly becomes either deep mud or light dust depending on
the weather. During the day, the metal roofs conduct the sun’s heat, regularly
surpassing 100 degrees inside. At night, the air is damp and cold, often below
freezing. The bathrooms and showers are shared in separate plywood buildings
with cold, concrete oors.
During the rst and last phases of my eldwork, I lived in a one-room, 10 foot
by 12 foot unit that the farm calls a cabina [cabin] in the middle of the largest
labour camp on Tanaka Farm. It would more appropriately be categorized as a
“shack”. Normally, a minimum of one family would share this size shack. In
the fall, as the night temperatures dropped, my breath condensed and froze to
the underside of the roof as I slept, and then melted and rained inside as the sun
rose. My shack had one old mattress with several rust stains, a tiny sink with
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