From the early 1970s, working class writing and publishing in local communities rapidly proliferated into a national movement. New literary and historical work challenged dominant cultural ideas and practices. This book is the first full evaluation of these developments which opens up new perspectives on culture, class and identity over the past fifty years.

The origins of this cultural explosion are traced in the context of international shifts in class politics, civil rights, personal expression and cultural change. The actual written output is analysed through a number of lenses, looking at the work of writing workshops, young people, older people and adult literacy groups. Understanding the creative energy of these groups, and the individuals within them, provides crucial insights into everyday working class life often hidden from mainstream commentators. A number of thematic chapters explore the way audiences consumed this work, the learning of writers on a cultural journey, the fierce debates over identity, class and organization as well as the reception of this work within the broader institutional frameworks of the Arts Council among others.

This book is accessibly written but engages with a wide range of scholarly work in History, Education, Cultural studies, literature and sociology. As such it will be an important book for both students and lecturers as well as the interested reader.