Viewed from the perspective of the Florida peninsula, the essays in this collection explore the history of labor in the United States and Caribbean, highlighting the ways this view provides new insights into shifting race and ethnic relations, gender roles, class definitions, and human migration from the Spanish colonial period through the present day. Florida provides a unique window onto the transformation of American labor over the past four centuries, underscoring the international and national developments that have shaped, and been shaped by, the lives of working men and women. Book jacket.