[Book Review] Castoffs of Capital: Work and Love among Garment Workers in Bangladesh. By Lamia Karim. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2022. 256 pp.

With the globalization of the apparel industry and the rise of export giants like China and Bangladesh, the reigning stereotype of garment assembly line workers holds them to be young, female, and victimized. Lamia Karim's Castoffs of Capital: Work and Love among Garment Workers in Bangladesh provides an antidote to this limited view. Using ethnographic and life history research, Karim presents a nuanced portrait of the aspirations and realities of low-wage factory workers through the stories of their lives both inside and outside the workplace. Comparing younger women workers with older women who have “aged out” of the industry, Castoffs of Capital traces how class, gender, and age shape workers' capacities to craft meaningful lives on their own terms. With careful attention to love relationships, household arrangements, and the physical toll of factory work, Karim's analysis contrasts workers' hopes for a good life with the stubborn persistence of “cruel optimism” (Berlant, 2011) when their aspirations are turned against them.