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A powerful and important work of investigative journalism that explores the runaway growth of the American meatpacking industry and its dangerous consequences.On the production line in American packinghouses, there is one cardinal rule the chain never slows. Every year, the chain conveyors that set the pace of slaughter have continually accelerated to keep up with Americas growing appetite for processed meat. Acclaimed journalist Ted Genoways uses the story of Hormel Foods and soaring recession-era demand for its most famous product, Spam, to probe the state of the meatpacking industry, including the expansion of agribusiness and the effects of immigrant labor on Middle America.Genoways interviewed scores of industry line workers, union leaders, hog farmers, and local politicians and activists.



About the Author

Ted Genoways

Ted Genoways (born 1972) was the editor of the Virginia Quarterly Review from 2003 to 2012. He graduated from Nebraska Wesleyan University, Texas Tech University with an MA, and from the University of Virginia with an MFA. His work has appeared in DoubleTake, New England Review, Ploughshares.



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