Workplace Matters: Migrant Worker Women in Maryland’s Crab Industry

Hear about the impact that COVID has had on migrant worker women in Maryland’s crab industry.
 
Thursday, November 19, 2020
7-8 pm
Zoom

Watch the recording here.

About the Presenters

Moderator Lindsey Baker is the Executive Director of Maryland Humanities and co-founder of Baker Cruz Services. She has a Master’s in History and Museum Studies from the University of Delaware and a Bachelor’s in History from Goucher College.

Emilia Guevara is a PhD candidate in anthropology at the University of Maryland, College Park. Her doctoral research is a multi-sited ethnographic investigation examining the everyday lives of transnational migrant women living with chronic illnesses who travel from their sending communities in rural Hidalgo, Mexico to the receiving communities of Maryland’s Eastern Shore.

Sulma Guzmán is a social justice attorney at Centro de los Derechos del Migrante who advocates for workers’ rights in multiple forums at the state and federal level. Prior to CDM, as an attorney at the Public Justice Center’s Workplace Justice Project, Sulma provided legal counsel to the coalition that successfully passed Maryland’s Paid Sick Days law, as well as direct representation of clients in wage-and-hour cases. Access “Breaking the Shell,” the report Sulma Guzmán co-authored, here.

Aubrey Vincent is the Sales Manager at Lindy’s Seafood located on Hooper’s Island, home to eight of the state’s 20 crab-picking houses. She holds a Master of Arts focused in Peace Studies and Conflict Resolution from Salisbury University.

About the Partner and Program

The BMI is partnering with Centro de los Derechos del Migrante (CDM) for the third program in the Workplace Matters series. CDM supports Mexico-based migrant workers to defend and protect their rights as they move between their home communities in Mexico and their workplaces in the United States. With a binational, multilingual staff and geographic reach they have grown in response to increasing needs for its advocacy and services and seek to overcome the border as a barrier to justice.

The Baltimore Museum of Industry celebrates the dignity of work, and can provide a forum for exploring how the pandemic has impacted – and continues to impact – people’s experiences on the job. The BMI’s programs and activities highlight such issues as workers’ rights and workplace equity. The BMI’s “Workplace Matters” program series explores contemporary workplace issues in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. Other programs in this series include a conversation on the role of unions and workers’ safety during the pandemic and discussion of systemic racism in the workplace.