In the book Rereading America, a passage “Looking for Work” by Gary Soto narrates his life as a young Mexican- American boy. As a nine-year old boy, he compared his life with modern white families that he watches on his television. Throughout the passage, Gary gives examples of how his life is different, compared to the modern family and his Armenian-French neighbor. He mentions how money and luxuries play a big role in society. Gary and his neighbor are obviously in two different social classes.
Delaney Kennedy Essay Overview on “Aint no Makin it” Are you and Hanger or a Brother- the social mobility of two different races. In the book Ain’t no Makin’ it Jay Macleod presents a theory very on in this book, he calls this the “Achievement Ideology”.
The Brothers faced this challenge in their, largely, futile attempts to achieve middle class status through achieving a proper education. Macleod highlights that, historically, the “overall structure of class relations from one generation to the next” is extremely reluctant to change(4). The Brothers evince this in their inability to earn work with greater wages than their parents, forcing them to live in working class neighborhoods like they did. Although some of the Brothers did manage to obtain middle class work, they struggled to keep those jobs as they either got laid off or were pressured out believing that they just didn’t fit in the workplace environment- though this is largely in fact due to differences in cultural capital, knowledge, disposition, and skills passed on generationally, that arise from the different upbringings of the supervisors and the Brothers.
Second Sons could also fit in this material motive because it was the idea that the first son in the family inherited all the money and land from his father and the Second Son was left
Ford argues “Today's black underclass may not be as poor as many blacks were in the 1950s, but its isolation from the mainstream and from positive role models is actually worse.” This shows that there is in fact a correlation with social and economic structure in the negligence of education towards black students.” Lubrano says “They feel pressure from other working class friends to not participate and are told that they are being educated is effeminate and irrelevant” Ford cakn use Lubranos comparison between blue-collar kids and white-collar kids, where the black community would represent the blue-collar workers (working class) and the white community would represent white-collar workers (middle class). This argument could help frame Fords point on whites being the exclusive domain in the mainstream
Social Group: Fathers During this time period, fathers were the “breadwinners” and expected to work and provide for their families. However, black fathers in the 1950’s particular had to work long hours because the only jobs available to them were often low paying. This directly correlates with African-American’s low place on the social ladder during this pre-Civil Rights era. It was also extremely difficult for African-American women to find work during this time, placing the financial buren solely on the father.
Also if you look at the social structure the father is higher up the social structure than the son so it makes the
Unfortunately, this does not account for institutionalized racism, unequal access to education and services, and a system that perpetuates a growing divide between the rich and the poor. In McKinnon’s article he argues that our location of birth has an affect of how we are born: poor, rich, or middle class, “The reality is that where you’re born matters tremendously. where you start in life, unfortunately, has a huge impact on where you’ll end up. Think about it. A zip code is not just a number, it represents everything inside of that area – including the hospital in which you are born, the schools where you attend, the streets on which you will play, the stores and restaurants that will feed you, and the jobs to which your parents and eventually you might have access.”
Unequal Childhoods is an ethnography outlining the study done by Annette Lareau which researched how socioeconomic classes impact parenting among both white and African American families. She used both participant observation and interviewing. 12 families participated in this study where she came to conclusions on whether they displayed parenting styles of concerted cultivation or natural growth based of their socioeconomic status. Concerted cultivation is a parenting style where the parent(s) are fully invested in creating as much opportunity for their child as possible, but results in a child with a sense of entitlement. An example of this would be a parent who places their children in a wide array of extracurricular activities and/or actively speaks to educators about the accommodations their child needs to effectively learn.
Throughout the story, True Son proves himself to be a bold, dignified, and altogether very principled young man. In the
The son himself follows more of his mother’s personality, because he always thinks ahead. This is evident by the quote “…bothered teachers for homework assignments far ahead of their due dates so I could draw up schedules.” This shows that the son thinks ahead and likes to plan for the future, a characteristic he shares with his mother. The fathers care free, go with the flow personality is exemplified by his multitude of last runs.
The father-son relationship is used as well to exploit the importance
In the early 1970’s, productivity and income growth slowed, and when growth rebounded in the 1980’s and 1990’s, earnings inequalities rose dramatically, as the highly educated pulled away from others and well-paid industrial jobs dwindled. Women and college educated workers continued to enjoy gains, but the earnings of less-educated men deteriorated. Employment declined most dramatically for less-educated African American men, who also married less often and became more involved in illegal activities. With these dramatic shifts, job training seemed less relevant, and experts and leaders instead grew more concerned with gaps in education and achievement across racial and income gaps. Politics and policies also changed—in the direction of pressing
Both sons understand their fathers efforts but they are shown in
His idiosyncrasy remains loving and understanding, even when his younger son returned home after many of been away with not a penny to his name. The young son showed disobedience to all the goodness his father had offered to him. The young son showed traits such as selfishness as well as being ungrateful. He had no worth for his father’s property nor did he want to work alongside his father on the family farm.
