Core Values Within With the first day of any core class there is a slight apprehension to what can be held within the semester ahead. The moment I stepped out of the classroom after the first day, I came to the realization this class was going to change me as a person. Through many readings, discussions, movies and personal opinion papers my values, knowledge, and future actions have both changed and strengthened. Three questions have been answered throughout the semester, Who am I? What do I know? and Based on what I know how should I act? Human behavior has enlightened me with issues that I can personally relate to and the effect has easily been the most beneficial compared to any other core class I have taken. Values are a person 's …show more content…
Much of the class was centered on social class and particularly the working poor. The book Nickeled and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich should me a perspective I was aware of but not completely educated on. When Barbara went to find housing at almost every place it was too expensive to afford. By reading more into the book I found out many people in America are struggling to find affordable safe housing. This shocked me. By reading about this I gained the knowledge that everyone isn’t as lucky as I am and are working extremely hard to get out of the situation they are. Also there was a strong community connection amongst the workers everywhere people went. This made me realize that connections to people are probably one of the most important things you can have when you have close to nothing. It made me think about how my life would be if I were raised in a different environment. Like the story of The Other Wes Moore, I could have been the other Mackenzie Webber. A quote said by the author Wes Moore, “The chilling truth is that his story could have been mine. The tragedy is that my story could have been his.” I was able to learn that surroundings and actions you do truly do influence the way you grow up. By turning this situation on myself, it is amazing how different my life would have been if my parents didn’t make the sacrifices they did or …show more content…
The Young men observe life in New York, Ghana and Peru trying to find what the meaning of life is. When the men went to the different places I learned that in order to fully understand someone’s situation you need to place yourself in their shoes. There are so many people around the world who are living in a way unlike my own. I think it is truly important to go out and experience it all before making assumptions about people and their way of
Nickel And Dimed: Occupations Barbara Ehrenreich provides evidence in “Nickel and Dimed” that she’s an outstanding author with this book. Its engaging and compelling, no question about that. But it’s hard to get from side to side at times since of the authors attitudes. Her key summit is to carry concentration to the scrape of the working deprived, but she manages to be both abusive and divisive. Occupation on attacking our industrialist system, she fails to become aware of that the endurance of upper classes seems to be what motivates the poor, fairly than what dispirits them. She blames capitalism for the injustices of the world, slightly than easy bad management techniques. A company should be shown that would benefit from a union and it will be shown to all around that one that will promote even better from decent, gentle management decisions. Most irritating, she’s constantly negative about the whole lot, even the positive experiences she has. When one of her colleagues offers to allow her move in with her and her family, not only does Ehrenreich turn the propose down, but she still describes it sneeringly as a "touched by an angel moment." Does she have to dribble with irony yet when writing about an authentically type deed? She condemns "visible Christians," any and all organization, yuppies, anybody who hires and consequently exploits maids, welfare reform, and still tosses in a prod at people who study John Grisham. Is there someone she likes? Her logic is troublesome as well. She begins her research to see if the functioning poor have some financial endurance tactics that the center class don’t know regarding, and decides at the conclusion that no, they don’t, as if admitting that this would signify the poor are imp...
Cause and Effect The author of Nickel and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich, began her experiment in Key West because she lived near there. Then she moved to Portland, ME since it was mostly white.
In the novel Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehnreich, there are many hurtles she must overcome to experience the life of a low income worker. She sets some ground rules for herself, such as always having a car, and starting out with a certain amount of money for her down payment on an apartment. Although the rules are doable, she admits that she broke all of the rules at least once. Even though Barbara didn't hold to her original plan, she was still able to reveal her appeals clearly.
Barbara Ehrenreich’s use of logos in order to gain the reader’s support and approval was prevalent throughout this section. She clearly outlines her credibility and aptitude in the introduction of her novel - she mentions her education as well as statistical facts about hourly wages in the United States and how they will relate to her experiment. She points out her “…PhD in biology, (which she) didn’t get by sitting at a desk and fiddling with numbers” and how “According to the National Coalition for the Homeless, in 1998 it took an hourly wage of $8.89 to afford a one-bedroom apartment…the odds against a typical welfare recipient’s landing a job at such a ‘living wage’ were about 97 to 1.”
Fitzgerald and the journalists of Class Matters both placed major emphasis the differences in between classes and the absence of class mobility. This was in order to show that changes must be made and class mobility needs to increase. Both classes need to take on some characteristics of the opposite class in order for this to happen.
Gregory Mantsios advocates more on the struggle to proceed from one class to another in his essay-“Class in America”. Mantsios states that, “Class standing has a significant impact on our chances for survival....
Social class has always been a controversial issue in America. This idea, that individuals are defined by their wealth, is explored by Jeannette Walls in her memoir, The Glass Castle. Walls shows, through a manifold of personal anecdotes, how growing up in a dysfunctional household with financially inept parents affected her and her siblings. Growing up in this environment, Jeannette was exposed to a very different perception of the world around her than those of higher social status. However, despite the constant hardships she faced, Walls makes it clear that a lower social status does not define an individual as inferior to those in a higher class.
Class is a “relational social categorization based on economic, cultural, and social characteristics” (Barnes 2016) this includes a person’s: income and wealth, networks and connections, cultural knowledge, and social status. When a person has a high social status, that often means that they have more power in society compared to a person who is in a lower social class than they. A good example of class and how it separates the lower classes from the higher classes are private schools. Private schools are often very expensive and people who are in lower class systems often cannot afford to send their kids their, causing an even larger gap between classes. In Conley’s memoir, with him switching schools from a public, working class school to a private, middle class school shows how the schools that people go to can greatly effect their
If you have ever read the book 1984 by George Orwell, then an interesting topic may have crossed your mind. The way the classes of people break down can be quite similar, and very different at times. In the United States, we have classes like the lower class, the working class, and the middle class. In 1984, there were such classes as the Proles, the Outer Party, and the Inner Party. The way the classes are broken down in 1984 reminds me a little bit of my old history class. When I studied medieval times and the classes back then were broken down into the nobles, the bourgeois, and the serfs.
According to Newman in Sociology: The Architecture of Everyday Life, a social class “consists of people who occupy similar positions of power, privilege, and prestige” (Newman, 2012). Someone’s position in a social class can affect “virtually every aspect of their lives, including political preferences, sexual behavior, religious affiliation, diet, and life expectancy” (Newman, 2012). The social class that was represented in the film was the middle-class. The show, Pleasantville, portrays the 1950s in which the wife would stay at home cooking and cleaning while the father works. This show holds similar views to the show, Leave it to Beaver. The movie begins
In Barbara Ehrenreich’s book “Nickel and Dimed” a social experiment of the greatest magnitude is taken underway. The journalist is Ehrenreich herself and the experiment was about a woman, who was recently removed from welfare, would survive on a six to seven dollar hourly wage. In addition to this experiment, Ehrenreich promised herself that she would never use her college degree to land a job, always take the highest paying job if offered to her, and find the cheapest living conditions to accommodate herself with. While immersed in her ‘experiment’ Ehrenreich ends up travelling to Florida, Maine, and Minnesota looking for jobs and places to live on a minimum wage salary. Ultimately
As we can clearly see, socio-economic status and class conflict both affect each character in the story in a different way, but ultimately lead to the same place. Class conflict is a major theme from the beginning of the story. “Whenever you feel like criticizing anyone” he told me, “just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had” (1). A quote from Nick’s father on the first page of the novel immediately sets the theme of class conflict. Even though this is a piece of advice about humility, it still highlights the economic and power gap between the American upper and lower classes.
Social classes are a dividing system for people of a nation or country, and have existed for as long as history can date back. In the past, it has designated people to certain categories that determined the opportunities and privileges that they could receive. In the past, the social class a person belonged to was determined by which one he or she was born into, and this label generally stuck to someone for life. In more recent history, broadened opportunity has opened up an escape for those stuck in the lower classes. The social class a person is born into has become a starting point in life, and where somebody ends up is decided by his or her determination. In Toni Cade Bambara's “The Lesson,” the theme is about learning that a person can break free of the inequality of a social class, which is shown by the use of plot, characters, and symbols.
Social Class starts off in the book when Claudia describes her house and current living situation. “Our house is old, cold, and green. At night a kerosene lamp lights one large room. The others are braced in darkness, peopled by roaches and mice.”(10). Another example of Claudia’s lower status is when her mother gets upset when Pecola drinks all the milk. Claudia’s family can not afford to go through milk like that without losing a lot of money. Claudia’s mother says “Time for me to get out of the giving line and get in the getting line.”(24).Social class is also stated in the book early when Claudia talks about being “put out” and being “put outdoors”. This shows the difference between poverty and homelessness.“There is a difference between being put out and being put outdoors. If you are put out, you go somewhere else; if you are outdoors, there is no place to go. The distinction was subtle but final....Knowing that there was such a thing as outdoors bred in us a hunger for property, for ownership” page 17 (Toni Morrison).Pecola was homeless ...
What is the most important concept that you learned in this class? Write this for a reader who is unfamiliar with the concept.