Introduction

In John Steinbeck’s The Grape of Wrath, the Joads’ experience in the government camp shows that the migrant workers would gather around and enjoy the music and dance on a Saturday evening for entertainment (Steinbeck, 335). Also, Steinbeck also mentions a few times in the novel that the Joads family would sing songs when they are camping on the road (Steinbeck, 199). Unfortunately, the readers never really get the chance to understand what kinds of music that the Okies listen and created while traveling. However, the music that the Okies listen to can provide valuable educational information for students to learn about the history and life of the Okies because “music not only opens a window to the past, but carries with it the emotions and sentiments—feelings that were incorporated into the music when it was composed—that can share by all” (Whitmer, 1). Thus, I decide to collect recording, music transcript, and pictures about the music that Okie workers listen and catalog them into a collection for this “Okie’s Song in the Work Camp” exhibition.

The purpose of my exhibit is to explore the music that the Okies listen in the government camp, especially in the context of lyrics and theme. The topic of music include the songs that the migrant workers learn from their family back home and the music they composed while going on a journey to California and living in the government camp. Overall, “Okies’ Songs in the Work Camp” investigates how the songs that the Okies workers listen and perform can teach us about what they are going through in that time and what kinds of personality that the Okies have. In this exhibit, you will find audio recordings of the Okie workers from Arvin FSA camp singing a song that they want to share with the other campers. Through providing the visitors an opportunity to listen to the Okie’s performance in the camp and read about the music transcripts that the migrant workers composed, this exhibition aims to shed some light to the music reference appeared throughout the novel and expand the readers’ knowledge about Steinbeck’s The Grape of Wrath.

While collecting the songs performed by the Okies, I found that it is difficult to locate the songs and music transcripts that the migrant workers produced since they did not have the resource and equipment needed to record their music and preserve their writing. Besides that, Steinbeck also did not leave many footnotes that help the reader to investigate the music reference in The Grape of Wrath. Fortunately, Charles Todd and Robert Sonkin composed the Migrant Workers’ Songs in California that provided plenty of details about the songs that the migrant workers listen. The Migrant Workers’ Songs in California consists of the field notes written by Charles Todd and Robert Sonkin during their expedition through the California migrant labor camps in July and August 1940. During their expedition, Todd and Sonkin recorded the migrant workers’ music performance and wrote down what they had seen.