Hey, waitress! : the USA from the other side of the tray / Alison Owings.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Owings, Alison, Author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Waitresses--United States--Biography.

Waitresses.

Food service--United States.

Food service.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (343 p.)

Place of Publication:

Berkeley, CA : University of California Press, [2002]

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Most of us have sat across the tray from a waitress, but how many of us know what really is going on from her side? Hey, Waitress! aims to tell us. Containing lively, personal portraits of waitresses from many different walks of life, this book is the first of its kind to show the intimate, illuminating, and often shocking behind-the-scenes stories of waitresses' daily shifts and daily lives. Alison Owings traveled the country-from border to border and coast to coast-to hear firsthand what waitresses think about their lives, their work, and their world. Part journalism and part oral history, Hey, Waitress! introduces an eclectic cast of characters: a ninety-five-year-old Baltimore woman who may have been the oldest living waitress, a Staten Island firebrand laboring at a Pizza Hut, a well-to-do runaway housewife, a Native American proud of her financial independence, a college student loving her diner more than her studies, a Cajun grandmother of twenty-two, and many others. The book also offers vivid slices of American history. The stories describe the famous sit-in at the Woolworth's counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, which helped spark the civil rights movement; early struggles for waitress unions; and battles against sexually discriminatory hiring in restaurants. A superb and accessible means of breaking down stereotypes, this book reveals American waitresses in all their complexity and individuality, and will surely change the way we order, tip, and, most of all, behave in restaurants.

Contents:

Front matter

Contents

Prologue

1 . A Brief, And Subjective, History Of Waitressing

2 . Slices Of American History

3 . "We Should Be Respected": Professionals

4 . High Ends

5 . "It Was Desperation Time": Waitressing As Salvation

6 . Diners And Downward

7 . Worlds Within Worlds

8 . After Shift

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

Notes

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 329-334).

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 24. Apr 2020)

ISBN:

9786612357558

9781597346528

1597346527

9780520931220

052093122X

9781282357556

1282357557

OCLC:

475927668