Portside

It begins with a short sequence in Sri Lanka: the civil war is over, the Liberation Tigers are burning their dead comrades’ bodies and swapping fatigues for civilian clothes to try and melt into the general population. In a refugee camp, a young woman is looking for unaccompanied children to be part of a hastily thrown together fake family, to help one such fighter get clear of the battle zone and into Europe.

At the end of March, soccer players Carli Lloyd, Becky Sauerbrunn, Alex Morgan, Megan Rapinoe, and Hope Solo went public. They filed a federal complaint accusing U.S. Soccer of wage discrimination. They earned significantly less money—roughly a quarter less, according to the complaint—despite dramatically outperforming the men’s national team, and despite producing nearly $20 million more in revenue for U.S. Soccer than what the men’s team brought in.

The 2016 Google Food Trends report confirmed consumers are seeking out functional ingredients, global flavors and customizable snacks, and revealed a few surprise findings, too

The strike and union campaign at Klein Management are part of a larger movement among indigenous Mexican farm workers, which is sweeping through the whole Pacific coast. Work stoppages by Triqui and Mixteco blueberry pickers have hit Sakuma Farms in Burlington, Washington, for the past three years. Workers there organized an independent union, Familias Unidas por la Justicia, and launched a boycott of Driscoll's, the world's largest berry distributor.

Kunta Kinte and his family’s struggle to survive is rendered in a sleeker, visually gripping package without diluting the historical vestiges that endure in America.

Last week, IAM District 15 announced the formation of the Independent Drivers Guild [IDG], a new association created to represent New York City’s 35,000 Uber drivers. The IDG will strive to secure job protections and benefits for Uber drivers without actually engaging in collective bargaining...

The exiled Persian poet Majid Naficy draws on Christian parable (the Book of Matthew), suggesting that some of the irate voices on our streets are not enemies but prophets.

France's new labor law allows a race to the bottom as employers take advantage of a fragmented workforce whose ability to call on the solidarity of workers elsewhere will be strictly controlled.

In David Looseley's take on the iconic French chanteuse Edith Piaf, her notoriously elusive life story is rendered as cultural history, drawing out what Piaf meant - and still means - to France and to her wider audience. Looseley notes that her musical persona was highly and brilliantly constructed. She projected a stage mask of suffering that was all the more affecting because the audience saw there was deprivation behind it. With Piaf, you underwent her.

This new book reconsiders the social and political impact of the energy crisis of the mid 1970s.