Natalie Reitz’s Blog

I’m still in shock that this is my final blog post for the semester. I feel like I have a lot left to do on my MA Project, but I also am very proud of all the work I’ve done on my MA Project so far. The feedback I received on my Proof of Concept was very positive and I agree with the critiques. People liked my cinematography and hope that I will provide extra context to what I’m showing on the screen, either through text on screen or through better VO. I was also told some of the audio is unbalance. Apart from improving audio (I’ll see a lot of you in the audio workshop) I plan on providing better VO because I can also subtitle that.

I would like for my next deliverable to be my full rough cut! I plan on doing my primary interviews in January and I have a lot of people to talk to. I have my committee and I think my next big hurdle is first drafts of my paper and my first rough cut.

Finally, I have spoken with my former supervisor at WHYY about giving my film a home there. This would be my first choice but I also am open to other options. I will discuss other options with my project chair.

It was great being in class with all of you and I’m glad I will be in class again with so many of you next semester!

For my second-to-last (!!) blog post, I decided to read a chapter from Professor Bryant Simon’s (2009) book Everything but the Coffee: Learning about America from Starbucks. I read Chapter 6: Not-So-Green Cups, a look at Starbucks’ environmental messaging and how it ends up at odds with the less-than eco-friendly realities of Starbucks business practices. Simon discusses how alongside Americans becoming more distrustful of the government and political processes, many Americans have turned to corporations to solve global issues, which ironically the same corporations have largely caused (2009, pp. 174-175). One of the largest problems with these private solutions is that corporations do not want to invest in solutions that take away from their bottom lines, which Simon exemplifies throughout the chapter. Unsettlingly, Simon writes that many of us have “eschewed the political path, opting instead to have [our] buying speak for [us]” (2009, pp. 175). We have accepted the minimal efforts made by corporations while hurtling towards climate disaster, in part because we believe we lack power to meaningfully change our surroundings.

This chapter reminded me of a discussion I had with Sarah at the Red Cup Strike last Thursday. I mentioned that Chelsea Manning was a former Starbucks employee and that I met her a couple years ago and she told me part of why she left her Starbucks job to enlist in the military was she needed better benefits. After sharing Chelsea’s story, Sarah described Starbucks as a “queer honeypot” – they offer some really excellent benefits to trans people but make the benefits challenging to access. I want to talk more with Sarah about this when I interview her and hopefully with Professor Simon if he agrees to talk with me.

These past two weeks have been eventful for my documentary. On the 16th, I filmed the Starbucks Workers United’s protest against Red Cup Day outside a Starbucks in University City with help from Aaliyah (thanks Aaliyah!) I have included that in my proof of concept. After discussion with my partner I think I will opt for VO and he has kindly agreed to lend his voice to my project. I also finally heard back from Starbucks and while they declined an interview, they gave me a list of their talking points which I will include in my documentary. I plan on seeing if anyone involved in the union decertification efforts will speak with me – I still think that will provide an interesting counterpoint for viewers to consider and will ensure a balanced story. Finally, after reading this chapter by Professor Simon, I have reached out to see if he would be willing to be in my documentary. I would be interested in talking with him about Starbucks branding as a progressive company being at odds with what is experienced by union employees.

Work Cited:

Simon, B. (2009). Not-So-Green Cups. In Everything but the Coffee: Learning about America from Starbucks (1st ed., pp. 173–200). University of California Press. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/j.ctt1pp5hm.10

This week, I decided to read scholar John Logan’s piece High-Octane Organizing at Starbucks. This piece was a useful look into the recent history of how Starbucks Workers United organized beginning in 2021 in Buffalo, NY, with special attention to Starbucks’ union busting techniques. The piece also discussed the unique flexibility of the SBWU organizing model, which I would like to share with viewers. It is useful because it is a grassroots model, beginning with individual workers in different stores connecting with one another. It is highly adaptable to different workplaces because it is dependent on the existing relationships workers have with one another; a sturdy base to join together upon.

Truthfully, I wish I had read this piece earlier. Logan’s work aligns well with what SBWU have shared with me and I’m learning specifics about Starbucks anti-union activities that will be useful in my own documentary. I’ve been thinking a lot about how I want to shape my documentary in a way that’s useful. I spent a lot of time so excited about the union’s roots that I hadn’t put as much thought into the present reality of what SBWU is facing: a David and Goliath battle against a giant international corporation. While I worry that it might be harder to convince people to organize when they see how hard it is, I think it’s also important to be honest about the challenges and I know SBWU thinks they can win – I want them to win because I want all of us to have more control over our working lives.

During the workshop, we ran out of time and I wasn’t able to get feedback on my moodboard, but I got very positive feedback on the questions I plan on asking the union and the Starbucks representative (if they’ll talk to me!) For my proof of concept, I plan on putting together the footage I’ve already shot and maybe an interview? If not an interview I’ll provide narration over the protest footage I’m shooting this Thursday.

Work Cited:

Logan, J. (2022). High-octane organizing at Starbucks. New Labor Forum, 31(3), 36-42. https://doi-org.libproxy.temple.edu/10.1177/10957960221117829

This week, I decided to read a piece shared with me by Dr Shaw. One of my committee members Yvonne Latty, a seasoned journalist, told me I should get an opinion from Starbucks in my documentary to avoid it turning into a union PR piece. I believe an interview with Starbucks will also serve to underscore the need for a union in the first place. I want to be well-prepared to interview Starbucks because I know the facts they share with me will be full of corporate spin. I was excited to receive Up the Anthropologist: Perspectives Gained From Studying Up by Laura Nader (1974) from Dr Shaw.

Nader’s article examines the need for anthropologists to study “up,” or to study those in power (Nader 1974, pp. 284). Nader argues that studying up is an attempt to “get behind the facelessness of a bureaucratic society, to get at the mechanisms whereby far away corporations and large scale industries are directing the everyday aspects of our lives” (Nader 1974, pp. 288). Instead of turning the microscope on those who lack power, positioning the anthropologist as having power within this dynamic, Nader advocates for looking into the reasons those in power have their societal power (Nader 1974, pp. 289). Nader also argues that the ethics in studying systems that affect the public differ from the ethics in studying private citizens or groups (Nader 1974, pp. 304-305).

This piece was very interesting in how it relates to my project. It identifies one of the cores of my project by looking deeply at a corporation that directs everyday aspects of the union group’s lives. However, Starbucks has made the argument that members should not let the union speak for them, that they can dialogue directly with the company, in my opinion purposely missing the entire point of having a union in the first place. It is easy to ignore one or even a handful of employees, but having a legally protected group of employees effectively forces the company to contend with the worker’s interests. I think shining a light on this phenomenon is deeply necessary for my documentary. Nader also discusses the challenges of having an honest interview with those in power. I think such interviews can still be very revealing in what they don’t say or how they choose to answer questions. I know that anything Starbucks tells me will have corporate spin, so I’m hoping to reveal what is in the spin.

In addition to beginning to speak with a Starbucks representative, I have been working with Yvonne to develop questions for the union. Yvonne also gave me the opportunity to work with a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist on some of my questions for Starbucks, which I’m very excited for. Finally, I had my first filming session with SBWU! We agreed that we will hold primary interviews after the Red Cup Strike.

Works Cited:

Nader, Laura 1974 (1969) Up the Anthropologist — Perspectives Gained From Studying Up. In Dell Hymes (ed.) Reinventing Anthropology, New York: Vintage Books, pp.284-311.

This week, I read an article by scholar Gino Canella about the relationship between technology and Starbucks Workers United (SBWU) exploring the central questions: “how are SBWU organisers communicating unionisation with their co-workers and the public? And, how are social media influencing workers’ campaigns and organising practices?” (Canella, 2023, pp. 2). Canella describes the unionization process as “semi-autonomous,” with SBWU’s parent union, Workers United, an affiliate of Service Employees International Union (SEIU), providing organizers with “legal support and training materials” (Canella, 2023, pp. 3). One of the benefits of organizing in this way is that each unionization campaign can be tailored to the needs of the particular store with the scaffolding of a larger organization to help resolve administrative and legal issues that arise during the unionization process (Canella, 2023, pp. 4). Canella also argues that social media itself might not be the impetus to radicalize workers to join a labor union; rather, workers are radicalized based off of their “material conditions” and the industrialized nature of their work (Canella, 2023, pp. 5). Importantly, Canella also discusses that while social media plays a role in the quick mobilization of allies within social movements, the movements themselves ultimately succeed or fail based off the strength of the communities formed by in concert with unionization activities.

This article was interesting and gave me a lot to think about in regards to my own documentary. It made me think a lot about social media usage within social movements and the gulf between raising awareness of issues and the movement-building actually needed to solve issues. It made me curious how SBWU in Philly communicates and it made me interested in learning more about the SBWU connections that made the Philly organizing process possible. It also made me think about union history, especially when Canella quoted a worker saying that Starbucks made organizing “sexy” (Canella, 2023, pp. 11). What makes us care about certain union pushes over others? Kim Kelly writes about this in her book about union history-a group she worked with were miners and Kelly suggested that story may have gotten less traction because coal power is less popular now than it was in the past. I think there is a significant lack of union history knowledge and it makes different organizing efforts feel like they are in a vacuum instead of as a part of something interconnected. I’d be interested to know why SBWU thinks their current efforts have borne more fruit and I added questions around this to my list of questions.

I received very positive feedback about my initial media! Most critically, people generally felt that I was leading them through an environment. If I use any narration in my documentary, I want it to help lead the viewer through the environment. Professor Zaylea’s feedback, that the piece tackled challenging subject matter in a way that was conversational and inviting, is exactly how I want my documentary to feel. I want to welcome people in to think deeply about unionization.

Work Cited:

Canella, G. (2023). Networked unionism: Reframing the labour movement and Starbucks Workers United’s hybrid 0rganising practices. tripleC, 21(1), 1-17. https://doi.org/10.31269/triplec.v21i1.1358.

This week, I read Kim Kelly’s excellent book Fight Like Hell: the untold history of American labor. I’ve been excited to read it for a long time and I hope to interview Kelly for my documentary. I like Kelly’s work because it is thorough and well-researched, yet written accessibly. Accessibility is deeply important to me in my own work – what good is a documentary about labor rights if it doesn’t serve the people who stand to benefit from it the most?

Kelly’s book could best be described as an intersectional survey of American labor history. Covering various labor movements spanning multiple centuries up until the present, Kelly specifically draws attention to the contributions of marginalized organizers and their specific struggles within various labor movements. Furthermore, Kelly explicitly names times organized labor and key figures within movements have left out BIPOC, women, LGBTQ people, immigrants, disabled people, and sex workers, to name some of the people left behind by mass movements. This history celebrates the significant achievements of workers who came together for greater labor protections and reminds readers of the immense work left to be done.

While I deeply enjoyed Kelly’s book and it solidified my desire to interview her, she did not closely cover the Starbucks workers efforts. She references the Pullman workers and George Pullman, the owner of the Pullman company, as being credited with the origination of tipped work. I’m curious to know if she would consider the Pullman workers’ eventual union the first service workers union. Aaliyah had also suggested I find a backup source in case I’m not able to interview Kelly and I plan on doing so.

I’m excited to share that on Monday, I went to my first union meeting! I have been invited to film at next week’s meeting, which is the union preparing for the Red Cup strike planned in November. The Starbucks union has also kindly offered to help with the creation of my facilitation guide. Finally, I plan on eventually holding interviews in the labor office – it provides an interesting background and is a safer place to meet than people’s workplaces.

Works Cited

Kelly, K. (2023). Fight like hell: the untold history of American labor. One Signal Publishers.

I’m very excited about how my research has progressed, especially having found Pedagogy of the Oppressed. I was most concerned with finding a theoretical framework because while I’m confident in my research abilities, I am less familiar with specific theories and when I think of theory, I usually am worried that I won’t understand it. I was pleasantly surprised that Pedagogy of the Oppressed worked so well with my project and that it expressed many personal opinions of mine. I’m looking forward to doing more reading!

I’m still very much in the preproduction part of my media, but I’m okay with that. I am going to a Starbucks labor union meeting next week, and Dr Shaw suggested that I read/reflect upon my notes/experiences for my initial media. I have also reached out to a labor reporter local to Philadelphia whose work I like to see if she’s interested in being interviewed for my documentary.

Pedagogy of the Oppressed shifted my project into an interesting direction. I realized after reading Freire that I needed to include a facilitation guide alongside my documentary. It’s great to have Starbucks workers talk about their organizing experience, but it’s not enough on its own to encourage people to talk about organizing for greater workplace rights if not a full-on union. Dialogue is just as important as visualization, if not more so, in starting talks about workplace rights.

I’m most excited about reading more to add to my project as well as beginning filming! I have one shoot date thus far and am hoping to get more under my belt. I have a few people who have agreed to PA for me and I’m going to try to get a grant so I can pay my workers. I’m excited to see my project come to life-my committee members are excited about my work and I’m excited to see which direction it goes.

Last week in Dr. Kogen’s class, I was introduced to the work of Paulo Freire and discovered Friere’s book, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, works as an excellent theoretical framework for the creation of a documentary and a facilitation guide to go along with the documentary.

Freire made many excellent points throughout Pedagogy of the Oppressed, but my biggest takeaways related to how I’ve chosen to do my project. Freire’s work heavily emphasized doing away with learning hierarchies, positing that teachers and students should learn in dialogue with one another instead of students being the receivers of knowledge from teachers (Freire 1970/2017). Freire also emphasized that liberation can only happen after oppressed classes learn of their condition and work together to build a new world, rather than taking on the role of their oppressors (Freire 1970/2017). Finally, Freire heavily stressed that change cannot come from the ruling classes, but that real change has to come from the oppressed classes, as they seek to regain their humanity, which Freire argues is all of our natural states (Freire 1970/2017).

Pedagogy of the Oppressed heavily justifies my methods in the creation of my documentary. I am speaking to people who have lived experience forming a union. I am using their story to inspire other workers to take actions at their own places of work. Finally, and likely most importantly, I am encouraging dialogue between workers, by encouraging them to apply their own thoughts and experiences to understanding the Starbucks worker’s stories and relating them to their own workplaces. I hope my documentary can serve as a blueprint to begin the thought process to answer the question of “how can I stand up for my rights within the workplace?”

Last week, I spoke with my Starbucks contact and they told me about an upcoming strike in November that I plan on filming. I’m excited to share that this week, I will be going to my first labor union meeting with the Starbucks Labor Union! I plan on taking notes to figure out what else to film and who I may want to talk to, as well as beginning to figure out my questions. Finally, I will be meeting with a potential committee member on Monday.

Works Cited

Freire, P. (2017). Pedagogy of the oppressed (M. B. Ramos, Trans.). Penguin Classics. (Original work published 1970)

In response to Dr. Shaw’s feedback on my academic sources, I decided this week to find an article that explores why scholars might choose to make a documentary film from a feminist lens. I was very excited to find this article, “‘My parents never read my papers, but they watched my film’: documentary filmmaking as feminist pedagogy,” because it gives voice to the many of the reasons I wanted to make a documentary about the Starbucks Labor Union.

Hess & Macomber, paraphrasing Rice et al., write that “digital forms of storytelling are especially relevant in our time-compressed culture and are effective tools for challenging dominant narratives” (2021). I am very familiar with this from my time interning for Detroit Public Television and WHYY. Hess & Macomber write that part of the effectiveness of documentary filmmaking lies in the fact that storytelling in a documentary film “[reveals] personal experiences in intimate ways” (2021). Viewers are encouraged to connect with the people depicted on the screen, especially when paired with “carefully facilitated discussions” meant to prompt viewer engagement with the material (Hess & Macomber, 2021). Hess & Macomber also touch on the ease of sharing films, titling their piece after student feedback about the class: “my parents never read my papers, but they watched my film” (2021). Documentary films are an accessible way to share information as they mainly require a platform to watch them on (e.g. YouTube, available for free on most smartphones) and an understanding of the language used in the film. Something Hess & Macomber touch on throughout the article is the potential for community building through documentary film-filmmakers collaborate with each other as well as larger community members (2021). I’m wondering how I can facilitate conversations around unionization through my own documentary and am considering creating a facilitation guide to go along with my documentary to encourage greater engagement with my film.

While Hess & Macomber’s article mainly focuses on the making of documentary films as a tool to create feminist classrooms, their article makes many salient points as to why documentary films are effective educational tools in and out of the classroom. Even though they focus more on teaching the documentary film process, this article helped me verbalize the exact reasons I was drawn to make a documentary film in the first place. Their article also inspired me to create a facilitation guide to go along with my documentary film. I think a facilitation guide would enhance engagement with my film and hopefully provide a way for my film to more deeply resonate with my viewers.

Last week, I met with Kristina DeVoe and she helped me find some great resources for my paper. One of the challenges I’ve encountered is my desire to use Marxist thought in my paper (Marxism is central to many organizing philosophies), but being intimidated by reading the entirety of Das Kapital. Kristina told me about a source that explains the larger concepts of Das Kapital but is significantly shorter than the original work. I also reconnected with my Starbucks Labor Union source and plan on going to a meeting during October. Finally, I was able to secure my first committee member: Yvonne Latty in Journalism. Yvonne is my boss at The Logan Center and I have worked on several projects, including a documentary, with her. She gave me fantastic advice in planning my documentary: when storytelling, what are we seeing? This was part of the reason I wanted to go to the Starbucks Labor Union meeting-to begin plan out what my viewers will be seeing in my film.

Works Cited:

Hess, A. & Macomber, K. (2021). ‘My parents never read my papers, but they watched my film’: documentary filmmaking as feminist pedagogy. Gender and Education, 33(3), 306-321. DOI: 10.1080/09540253.2020.1763921

For this week, I found an older article that discusses Starbucks unionization techniques dating back to 2007. While this article is not as current, I am familiar with these techniques as my coworkers and I worked with the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) when we attempted to organize our store, which was a part of a larger corporation. This is part of the reason I’m comfortable focusing on just a few Starbucks stores in Philadelphia even though the push to organize has been a national effort. Each store organizes individually, instead of as a district. Additionally, the unionization effort is ongoing.

The article, “Solidarity unionism at Starbucks: The IWW uses section 7,” briefly explains the history of different laws used to direct the formation of unions, including the 1935 Wagner Act (Lynd & Gross, 2007). While the Wagner Act on the surface seeks to protect workers who engage in a collective action, including striking, picketing, or forming a union, the Wagner Act also aimed to preserve the “uninterrupted flow of commerce,” keeping businesses running through labor disputes and limiting direct grassroots action (Lynd & Gross, 2007). In Lynd & Gross’s case study of Starbucks Workers Union (SWU) in New York, Lynd & Gross explain the SWU’s solidarity labor union. While not a union recognized by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the SWU was still able to achieve wage increases and more consistent working hours per week, as well of recognition of strain injuries caused by barista work (Lynd & Gross, 2007).

This article is important because it discusses previous labor efforts used by Starbucks baristas before the current wave of organizing, providing historical context for the present, even though the current Starbucks union action is through Workers United, an affiliate of SEIU, to my understanding. It highlights ways workers can begin to fight for their rights and could be instructive to anybody who is not able to form a traditional union but would like to begin campaign for better working conditions at their place of work.

This week, I have been trying to identify how to move forward on my project. I was/to a degree still am struggling to conceptualize the next steps even though I’ve settled on a topic and a medium. I’m having trouble with the order of when different steps need to happen, which I think is a project management skill I’m still learning. I’m also going to continue to read Kim Kelly’s book “Fight Like Hell” and continue my research around this topic. Next Tuesday, I will meet with Kristina DeVoe to discuss more sources.

Works Cited:

Lynd, S. & Gross, D. (2007). Commentary: Solidarity unionism at Starbucks: The IWW uses section 7. Working USA: The Journal of Labor and Society, 10, 347-356. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1743-4580.2007.00166.x