Ever since the last decades of the 19th century has foreign workers migrinated to Iceland to work in fish processing industry. In the latter part of that century was the accommodation of workers very bad and Icelandic employers gave no true picture of working conditions or wages. Trade unions had nothing to do with these immigrants and language barriers made it hard for them to communicate with the locals. In the article The industry situation of foreign migrant workers, Wich was translated and published in the journal Language and Culture (Tímarit Máls og Menningar) 1980, Leah Kay describes the situation of migrant workers in Iceland. The Icelandic translation is published here.

Aðstæður erlends farandverkafólks