Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Food for Class Presentation
i wanted to bring in deviled eggs; i am making two dozen...so that should be a lot. i think they'll need refrigeration though, unless we eat them in the morning. there is a fridge in the LCS lounge but it's tiny. is there another in the english dept.? if not, i could ask one of the MAPW's to let us use their big fridge; but that will require transportation across campus.
Monday, April 25, 2011
Desi Lands
Shankar in Desi Land addresses the emergence of a hybrid Desi teen culture in San Jose that is distinct from the mainstream white culture. She notes that "Desi teen culture signals a generational consciousness and an effort to further define the category of Desi" (79). She points to their use of ethnicity and popular culture to define what it means to be Desi. Shankar also notes that "these meanings differ across class and other statuses" (79).
Although she applies her analysis to the South Asian community in general in San Hose, my experience with second generation Sri Lankan migrant teens living in California has been very different. Unlike the Desi teens that Shankar has studied , these Sri Lankan teens have very tenuous or almost no connection with their motherland in terms of language or culture. There is no strong common ethnic or cultural repertoire to bind Sri Lankan teens together, since the community is very small and scattered unlike the large population of Indian migrants living in San Jose. My overarching impression was that these teens are fully absorbed to the mainstream white teen culture and are separated by an unbridgeable gulf from their parents, who are first generation migrants.
Education, Division, and Failed Industry Edwin
Desi Land was an interesting look at modern day consumptions ad its implications for status by a particular social group. While the many experiences highlighted in this the Desis are not necessarily indicative of all immigrant groups, this study makes me wonder what is seen as progress for recent immigrants to America. From what we have read for today there seemed to be little focus on education as a tool to gain cultural capital. It only seemed to work as a means to an end for the families and the students mentioned, in that education in itself is not a sign of progress. For example, in the conclusion when one of the fathers, Mr. Malik, berated Shankar for not advising his child to do well in school so he could make a lot of money in the future. I’m curious to see if this particular trend continues down through the generations.
The explanation and frequent mentioning of the communities also left me with a question. In these tightly knit communities how is the class or income difference resolved. From the descriptions of the students and the communities that they belonged to it was clear that not everyone made the same amount of money. This fact was also likely made clear to everyone in the community due to the continuous flaunting of expensive goods to confirm status. Shankar’s explanation of metaconsumption confirms this. So how then did this not drive divisions in these communities as it does to society as a whole?
Finally, it was interesting to see how the prevailing industry influenced the many students. Many of these children seemed to have little interest in technology, yet due to their surroundings they professed desires to pursue careers in this field. Yet when the technology bubble burst they repudiated these interests for more financially secure ones. I wonder if similar cases occurred in Detroit or Pittsburgh after their own collapse of major industry.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
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.
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.
Monday, April 11, 2011
Women's Roles, or Lack Thereof
Brit
In Elizabeth Faue’s essay, “Gender, Class, and History,” she addresses the issues that working-class women studies faces, and still faces today. Often times, working-class studies ignore the concepts of gender and race in favor of trying to articulate the class struggles. The problem with this is that class is structured even further to include gender and race, and in order to get as much of the big picture as possible, these things need to be acknowledged. Faue did a good job of bringing these issues into perspective by highlighting the importance of gender, and women’s working-class history. “At the same time, there are perspectives on class identity and categories of experience—the most important of which is gender—that cannot be ignored in any study. The findings of the last forty years of work in labor history suggests—even demands—that gender and class (and, we also know, race) be seen as interlocking and interconnected categories” (31). She brings up the point that these categories are all woven together to create a narrative, and without incorporating as much of each category as possible, the narrative is incomplete. Further, throughout her essay she acknowledges that women are often overlooked, or gendered even within the studies as they often are within the working-class.
Through working-class studies we are able to see the role that women were often forced to take on in their work, and their seemingly lack of importance in terms of the work force ideals. “Still, they raised issues about domestic ideology and its impact on class politics, analyzed the sex segregation of the labor force and sex typing of occupations, and located gender conflict in workplace competition and occupational practice” (23). Women were gendered to specific jobs, such as nursing, and while these jobs were, and still are considered important, they were feminized to exclude men, just as certain skilled labor was attributed to masculinity to exclude women. Even today, it is apparent that there is still a battle between feminine ideals and masculine ideals. Men are still often excluded from nursing, although there are men who are nurses, just as women are still excluded from certain types of skilled labor thought to be too dangerous or labor intensive. To add insult to injury, women are not even equal to men in the work place today, often making less money and overlooked for promotions in favor of a man. Having working-class studies incorporate not only class, but also gender and race can open allow for a more historically accurate narrative that could, eventually, evoke change in ideals and workplace ideology.
just what kind of man are you, anyway, Mr. Frick?
Agatha
in particular, while reading Paul Lauter's chapter on working-class writing, i couldn't help making a comparison between the "inside" perspective of a working-class person versus the (seeming) "outside" perspective of our tour guide's description of the Frick family, and of servant life. i remember laughing to myself when we were in the library, and our tour guide noted that, on one of the paintings on the wall, the artist took the liberty to add an extra flounce of flowers to the painting "to make it more sentimental." contrast that to the line that Lauter quotes from "The Orange Bears": "i remember you would put daisies / on the windowsill at night and in / the morning they'd be so covered with soot / you couldn't tell what they were anymore" (65).
the image of those extra "sentimental" flowers, of the almost oppressive ornateness of the house, is so startling in contrast to the pitiful image of those soot-blackened daisies, of the violence and physicality of labor. i faithfully believed our tour guide when she testified that the Frick family treated their servants with great kindness and solicitousness; and yet, what of those thousands of others who, across the river, had no room in their lives for "extra sentimentality?" it is striking to consider that in one sense, there is very obvious display of intense labor in the opulence of the Frick home; and yet what is missing from this display is the physical, often brutal reality associated with that labor, whether it is the sweating laundress in the basement, the painstaking plasterwork of the craftsmen applying aluminum–aluminum, i tell you–to the walls of the breakfast parlor, or the strenuous toil of the factory itself, by whose capital everything in that house was realized.
to rival myself, however, i would like to know more about places like Frick's settlement house which our tour guide referred to. would such a place have been the kind of center that gave working-class people access to tools with which to define their "class sensibility," as Lauter calls it?
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