Class and Progress

Class and Progress

It was interesting to finish the class with a contemporary anthropological study of class and race in American society. As someone trained in Anthropology, I especially enjoyed Desi Land's close analysis of South Asian teenagers in California, but I think that Shankar was limited in her ability to analyze class, in part because of the context that she was looking at. One of my professors in undergrad taught me that most cultural Anthropology falls into one of two categories. The first, conflict Anthropology, looks at how societies deal with internal problems, rifts and power struggles. The second, cohesion Anthropology, examines societies as they operate as social structures and reproduce themselves. I believe that Shankar's study falls into the latter category, as it looks at the ways in which South Asian diasporic communities create space and support each other. Overall, Shankar gives a good impression of how South Asian teenagers deal with a dual cultural identity in the United States, moving between familial and social expectations in a complex, multicultural world.
However, Shankar's book raises a few issues about the difficulties of analyzing class in in a diverse and complicated world. She gives a cogent arguement that families that would be categorized as "working class" elsewhere fall more into the category of middle class due to the high wages in Silicon Valley, increased property values, model minority status and strong networks of family support. Clearly, the desis of Silicon Valley occupy a far more ambiguous position than Marx's bourgeoisie and proletariat. Issue of timing, wages, race and family structure inform the ways in which class is constructed in the region. Under this model, it would appear that classical conceptions of class cannot hold up against other social factors.
But, the 90s internet bubble provides a lens through which class can be understood better in relation to this study. Shankar points out that the bursting tech bubble totally changed Silicon Valley after she left, and altered the job prospects for the teenagers, often dictated by their family's economic status. What this may tell us about social class is how contingent it is on economic conditions overall. In times of growth and prosperity, conflict tends to die down; as the saying goes, a rising tide lifts all ships. Of course, we know that not all ships will rise, but enough ships rising can make class differences seem inconsequential. As the recent economic crisis indicates, social and class tensions are more intimately connected to the GDP than those of us on cultural side of the fence would sometimes like to admit.
All of that being said, class remains a real social category with real implications. Shankar's book continually shows more that the higher the class in Sillicon Valley high schools, the more popular, successful desis there were. Even in the tech boom of the late 90s, Shankar showed the ways in which class were inscribed into teenagers' lives. Though the economic conditions provided more opportunities for social mobility than usual, Shankar carefully lays out social differences between classes of desi teens.
Especially in complex capitalist societies, class often intersects with various other social, economic, racial and physical issues. Although progress sometimes masks the role of social class in the United States, it underlies economic relations to a great degree.