Respectability on the Line - Gender, Race, and Labor Along British and Colonial Indian Railways

Respectability on the Line offers a social and cultural history of railway labor in Britain and colonial India from the 1840s through World War I. The book treats the railway industry as a microcosm through which to study the history of capitalism in the liberal imperial era. Using company records, Mattie Armstrong-Price shows how executives shaped the domestic and working lives of higher-grade employees with an eye to cultivating their respectability. Meanwhile workers' writings reveal how railway towns provided opportunities for some employees to maintain non-heteronormative living arrangements. The book tracks these histories of everyday life while also outlining stories of early trade unionism. In Britain, railway unionists established benefit funds that mimicked company-sponsored provident funds, while in colonial India workers fought to gain access to company benefits on equal terms. This comparative study shows how industrial labor was made through conflict, subversion, and accommodation across an uneven imperial field.

Info autore

Mattie Armstrong-Price is Assistant Professor of History at Fordham University.

Dettagli sul prodotto

• Autori: Mattie Armstrong-Price
• Editore: University Of California Press
• Lingue: Inglese
• Formato: Tascabile
• Pubblicazione: 17.03.2026
• EAN: 9780520421561
• ISBN: 978-0-520-42156-1
• Pagine: 224
• Serie: Berkeley Series in British Studies
• Categorie: Scienze sociali, diritto, economia > Economia > Tematiche generali, enciclopedie; Scienze umane, arte, musica > Storia; European History, POLITICAL SCIENCE / Colonialism & Post-Colonialism, TRANSPORTATION / Railroads / History, Colonialism & imperialism, Labour / income economics, British & Irish history, United Kingdom, Great Britain, Labour Economics, HISTORY / Europe / Great Britain / General, Colonialism and imperialism, BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Labor / General