Working

The National Book Award winner’s classic oral history of Americans’ working lives—and the inspiration for Barack Obama’s new Netflix series about work in the twenty-first century



Few books have captured the American experience with such raw, unfiltered power. First published in 1974, Working is Studs Terkel’s landmark work of oral history, a sweeping, intimate portrait of labor in America told entirely through the voices of those who live it.

Drawn from over one hundred interviews with workers across every rung of American society—gravediggers and studio heads, spot-welders and stockbrokers, waitresses and corporate executives—Working does what no economic report or policy paper can: it puts a human face on the meaning of work. These are not statistics. These are real people, speaking in their own words, about pride and monotony, dignity and alienation, and the daily question that quietly defines us all: Does what I do matter?

Terkel’s genius lies in the architecture of the book itself. Contrasting voices from the same industries are placed side by side, revealing the fault lines of class, power, and identity that run beneath the surface of American working life. The result is a book that reads less like a document and more like a living, breathing chorus.

Nearly fifty years after its initial publication, Working remains one of the most important works of oral history ever published. The New York Times Book Review praised its “incredible abundance of marvelous beings” and “very special electricity and emotional power.” The Boston Globe called it “magnificent . . . a work of art” and declared, ”To read it is to hear America talking.”