Zweig and Greider

{quotes} "Deep change does not begin in the political process or with single issues; it begins among ordinary people deciding to change their circumstances" (Greider, 253). The articles at hand deal with this issue of class and how exactly America understands the division of it. Greider's article talks about moral economy and our problem with the idea of class in America and how to fix it. He talks about moral economy being and economy that "serves people and society first". He goes on to talk about how in this country capitalism causes "destruction of family and community, democracy, nature, and equality". Capitalism is a problem in this country. It causes what he calls 'abundance'. Meaning that goods and wealth exist in our society but it tends to get away from most people which leaves them with anxiety in order to keep up with life. He goes on to talk about how we need to fix this society. It cannot happen through the government because they always seem to not get it right. He says it needs to be fixed by society itself. The government can encourage positive change but society is the ones that need to do it. Society need to dream a little and put those dreams to work. For examples he says, start new companies, reform existing ones, and start new financial institutions. Society needs to be the one to change this. I mostly agree with where he is going with this but it is also difficult in a way. While I agree that society does need to take the reins on this, I also think government help is necessary. He is asking people to start new companies or reform old ones but it is difficult when an abundance of America is working class. They work to make ends meet how is he suggesting they are able to start new companies. It just does not seem feasible. Government help would be essential.
           
          Zweig's article goes over the six points about class. He talks about what needs to be changed about the idea people have of class and the way it is represented. First issue he talks about is how we need to change people's understanding of class. He states that many people see class in terms of "rich and poor" and they need to see it in terms of "worker and capitalist". Class needs to be broken down by power not by "wealth, income, or life style" (Zweig, 2). This tends to separate class from race and gender and that is something that it should not do. His second point was about two problems in American politics. That it makes us focus to much on race and we loss sight of class and that the "political target gets confused". When race gets involved with class we tend to lose sight of the divide. Many people hear poor and think Black when in reality most poor people in America are white. When it comes to politics we tend to blame the rich as the "the source of America's political misdirection". When in reality its really the capitalist class and their aim for a profit, not caring who gets in their way even if its the rest of America. Some of the other points he makes focus around pinpointing what class exactly is and having the country acknowledge it. Society needs to know what it is and how it not only affects us locally but globally too. Zweig talks about how we have to be aware of global economy and how class effects us on a global scale. It can cause job loss, cheap labor, and capital flight. Overall class is discussed in both of these articles. Telling us how much society is affected by it whether we acknowledge it or not and how we need to be part of the change. We need to bring class into the lights and help fix the whole class structure if we essentially want to fix America.

Jenson Chapters and Hooks article

{quotes} These texts clearly have a great deal to do with the class divide between working class and other classes, specifically dealing with higher education. The Bell Hooks article "Where We Stand: Class Matters" talked about a young woman's struggle with higher education in terms of race and class. Raised in a working class home she did not quite fit in when she got to college because it was clash of classes. She did not conform to the class standards of these wealthy girls she went to school with and they could not seem to figure out why. It also showed how the people around her viewed her class. She stated, "almost everyone around me believed working class folks had no values" (35). They did not understand where she was coming from and did not want to try and understand it therefore making her feel very uncomfortable. She later talked about her class in terms of how it affected her education. She said, "Slowly I began to understand fully that there was no place in academe for folks from working class backgrounds who did not wish to leave the past behind" (36). It is a struggle for working class people because they are stuck in a really difficult stop .

              They are from working class families who have a set of values that are quite different from other classes. Working class values community more than individualism. This becomes a problem when you get mixed in with other classes in higher education. They do not understand where you are coming from and they are not going to conform to you so either you assimilate into the middle or upper class values or you don't. Which leaves you with two options either leaving everything you know and conforming to a new set of values or being an outcast. These people who move into a new class have a sense of sadness because it forces them to go against what they grew up with and also it distances themselves from their friends and families who just can't grasp this new culture. They have a problem when crossing culture happens.

              Jensen states in chapter 6, "the less cultural capital they have form previous schooling, the more they face a tangle of extracurricular psychological, sociological, and cultural confusion". These people are not usually looking for a change in culture just a change in work. So the question lies in how do we deal with this? These college dreams threaten the working class identity. These people usually have to cope with it in one of three ways; distancing, resisting, or building bridges. When we get to the middle class we see a, "cultural emphasis on becoming through individual achievement". This means using self actualization whereas in working class self actualization may be "incomprehensible". The struggle between individualism (middle class) and community (working class) is evident. America seems to be heading more towards the idea of individualism and less with community making issues for the working class. Although this also creates the problem that we are losing social capital because of it. The class issue here is problematic when it comes to higher education. Working class students are finding it difficult to move ahead in the world without losing their sense of identity.

Articles on Women

{quotes}    These few articles on women were quite interesting. Some reconfirmed my thoughts on certain situations and others shocked me. I thought there was an interesting difference between not only gender issues but racial issues too. The article by Ransby about women and Hurricane Katrina was appalling. Looking back at the situation of Katrina we know that things could have been handled better. What I never knew was the the race issues that went on in the aftermath. Ransby talks about how most who were left behind and who were treated poorly were poor and Black. The ones who were the least helped and had the fewest resources were poor Black women (Ransby, 616). They are basically saying that these Black poor women who are typically single mothers are being looked at as unworthy of aid and that we should be unsympathetic which is astonishing. Everyone in the wake of this storm should be helped not just people with money or of a certain race. It went on to talk about how some say that they were trying to push poor black women and their children out of the city after this. They were trying to make a new city without the black poor (Ransby, 620). Instead of helping these people recover, find new shelter, make money, etc they thought maybe they could push them out and recreate the city with their own guild lines of who should live there in order to make it a better place. This was an article that targeted women, specifically bringing up the racial difference in terms of a national disaster and just how they are treated. It certainly does not help their case that they are women.
        The other articles we read also dealt with women in regards to wage, work schedules, and prostitution. The article "Minimum Wage" discussed how many women struggle to make ends meet. Most of these women are single mothers who have only their paycheck to rely on. Women being the large majority of minimum wage workers (2/3) (NWIC, 1). It talks about how we need to increase minimum wage to help these women make ends meet and be able to close the gap between men and women in terms of wages. This also ties in with the article "Working Mothers in a Double Bind". Which discusses flexible schedules and wages. Working mothers need the flexible schedules because they are the ones who need to take care of the kids. Even though they are the ones who needs the flexibility the most they are the least likely to receive it. Gender plays a role here again as does race. Men are more likely to have flexible hours. It also states that Blacks and women are less likely to have flexible jobs and equal opportunity (McCrate, 17). Race and Gender seem to come together here. Black people and women are less likely to have the opportunities in work that white men do.Taking it one step further, Black women seem to have even less of an opportunity for flexible work schedules.
        Zeroing in on our own state in "An Uneven Path", we see that we have a huge problem with helping women economically. Things that were set up to help low income women, especially single mother women has decreased drastically over the years. With budget cuts to these sort of programs it has sent women far below the poverty line. These women rely on these sort of things because their jobs pay minimum wage which we have discovered is not enough to keep a one paycheck family afloat. The cost of living is far to high for the amount of money they get paid. We need to help support these working mothers and help with generating the increase of minimum wage. This will not only help them but it will essentially help the economy because the more they make the they spent and put back into the economy and we know Rhode Island needs the help! All these articles are intertwined dealing with not only women but bringing in ideas of gender and race and how it affects things economically. Women need help and need to be allowed to close the gap on wages, and job flexibility.