For years, farmworkers have streamed to these
fields from Mexico to toil among the blueberry bushes. Under the
searing sun, they grimly load trucks with buckets of fruit for little
more than the minimum wage. In many ways, these Spanish-speaking
migrants worked at the bottom rung of the economic ladder. But in
recent years, a new group of indigenous workers has arrived from Mexico
and Guatemala. In many cases, they speak only obscure languages,
leaving them vulnerable to mistreatment from employers, even as they
face racism from some fellow workers. Decades of hard-fought battles
for workers' rights have created a safety net in places like Michigan
for Spanish-speaking migrant laborers. But growers, government
officials and worker advocates have been stumped by this new wave of
workers who speak only Mum, Quiche and other pre-Columbian languages of
Latin America. If a grower doesn't pay them for overtime work, or
houses them in shanties just feet from overflowing outhouses, these
workers cannot communicate with the Spanish-speaking lawyers who could
help them. [more ]
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