I am a Grenade

This is going to be my go-to article now when talking about the gender wage gap.  Luce and Brenner's main aim in this article is to highlight the change of wages since the 1960s primarily.  They also highlight the differences between white women and women of color.  They urge that despite the apparent change, there still remains an unavoidable gap because systematic issues have yet to be socially addressed.  The legislative victory for equal rights can only do so much--as Luce and Brenner point out "they were primarily enforced through individual lawsuits" and "these cases can take many years to resolve, and most working-class women have neither the time nor resources necessary to pursue them" (125-126).

While efforts can be made to make sure that women and women of color have access to higher education and better training, this does not do enough to combat social discrimination that impacts hiring and promotional rates.  Women are still being filtered into "easily replaceable" positions like "cashier, retail salesperson and waitress"--jobs that are not considered "good jobs" and are always undervalued and underpaid (127).  Luce and Brenner's example of the janitor versus the housekeeper highlights this discrepancy (124).  It will take mass social change to combat this without strict government monitoring and enforcement--gender and race bias in the workplace still goes largely unchecked.

In Annette Lareau's article on "Race, Class, and the Transmission of Advantage"  the main argument is that there is little-to-no difference between the "class resources" drawn upon by white middle-class families versus black middle-class families.  Lareau's main points of defense are that "middle-class parents presume that they are entitled to have the institution accommodate to their child's individualized needs" that they "feel comfortable voicing their concerns with people in positions of authority" and lastly that despite race, middle-class parents are "willing and able to climb the hierarchy of authority to pursue their interest" (1).

After giving her methodology and various examples that demonstrate parental demonstration, Lareau concludes that (for this particular age group) race is not a huge factor in the resources that middle-class parents draw upon in order to act in their children's best interest.  While I am skeptical of taking the word of a white woman in this matter, Lareau does acknowledge that race does play a role in what issues arise in black middle-class families and the added burden of weighing "the race factor" in when deciding whether or not to act on their child's behalf.  I realize, however, that it is not the point of the article to explore the idea that middle-class ideology is in and of itself a rather "white" class to begin with.

Jean Anyon's paper about the "Social Class and the Hidden Curriculum of Work" outlines a study performed in a few elementary schools in order to see how social class differences are being 'set up' in the school systems.  In the first part of the paper, definitions for social class are laid out as a series of relationships to production of capital, relationships to authority, and relationships to capital itself.

I found this article to be extremely engaging and right now I am trying to think of people that I can share this with.  The differences in teaching styles across the different school types was extremely interesting--especially the implications this makes for replicating class divide.  This is a direct confrontation to the idea that as long as everyone goes to school they have the same opportunities.  Clearly this is not the case, as totally different sets of skills are being taught depending on what "class" the school is in.  It is so frustrating, now, realizing that I was not taught the same caliber of creativity and analysis that children in the "Executive Elite" school were (or rather, I did not realize that it was possible for children in general to learn like this--I thought that the working and even middle class school teaching styles are all that children that age could comprehend).  The Executive Elite school reminded me very much of college--and college is the only time during my school career that I actually felt as though I was learning something, instead of just regurgitating memorized material.

The main point to OXFAM's briefing on "How Wealth and Income Extremes Hurt Us All" is to convince the reader that focusing on just extreme poverty is not enough.  It is important to focus on the "inequality and the extreme wealth that contributes to it" (1).  The article outlines how inequality is "reaching levels never before seen" and is "getting worse" showing disturbing statistics like "In the US the share of national income going to the top 1% has doubled since 1980 from 10% to 20%" and "For the top 0.01% it has quadrupled" (1).  These statistics show the reader just how unequal the rich and the poor are.  Perhaps it asks the question "just why would any one person need that much money, when people are literally starving?"--it highlights the greed of the top percents.

The article also discusses how extreme wealth and income effects economic efficiency, politics, corruption, the environment, and ethics.  This perhaps suggests that all other crises would be tremendously improved by paying attention to extreme wealth and extreme inequality that exists in the world.  By the end of the article, OXFAM urges the world to "end extreme wealth by 2025" stating that "in a world of increasingly scarce resources, reducing inequality is more important than ever.  It needs to be reduced and quickly" (4).  Overall, this is a tight and to-the-point persuasive essay on the dangers of the wealth gap.

Jonathan Kozol's piece "Amazing Grace" was extremely depressing.  He goes through describing the every-day struggles of the poor in New York--more specifically the effects on the poor children.  Right from the beginning of the piece Kozol highlights an important class distinction in parts of New York as illustrated by the subway.

"When you enter the train, you are in the seventh richest congressional district in the nation.  When you leave, you are in the poorest" (Kozol 3).

In Croteau's piece on "Media and Ideology" the author addresses the role of the Media in ideological representation.  Croteau states that the media helps to "define our world and provide models for appropriate behavior and attitudes" (159).  Essentially, the author argues that the Media plays a large role in showing (not necessarily telling) us how to appropriately behave in this society--as well as the consequences that can occur if one deviates from what is appropriate.