Philip Sheldon Foner

Philip Foner is the foremost historian on the labor movement in the U. S. He is the author of over eighty works, including a four volume history of the American labor movement, "Organized Labor and the Black Worker," and "Women and the American Labor Movement." Foner's specialities include labor history, African American history, and the history of women and Socialism. Foner has recently edited a collection of speeches and writings of Irish-American labor organizer Mother Jones.

Historian Philip Foner returns to Fresh Air to discuss a new collection of the prominent socialist's writings, which he co-edited. He explains her place within labor, women's, and anti-war movements, and how her experience as a political prisoner galvanized her activism.

Historian Philip Foner recently returned from a stint in China, where he lectured on the current state of civil rights, labor and women's movements in the United States. He shares his impressions of Chinese views on recent American history, as well as the current state of Chinese social conditions.