Studies of identity have proliferated over the last three decades; race, class, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, and nationalism all have been explored at length. Writing now in 2006, we can look back on a substantial body of theoretical and empirical work that has forever changed conceptions of identity formation. Although divisions persist between scholars of identity and those writing labor and working-class history, many have called for greater intellectual exchange across the class-identity divide. We hope to further that exchange by bringing together essays on working-class subjectivities and sexualities in this thematic issue.