Coming to Class Consciousness reminded me of various reading and class conversations we have had thoughout the semester from the very begining of the article. I remeber the first day of class we were asked to think back to our childhood and write about our class stories and what class we thought we identified with. Througout the semester I've learned how inacurate my initial response to that question was. The young woman talked about in this article, in some ways, reminded me of myself growing up. I always wanted the expwensie things advertised on TV and the prettiest dresses on magazines I would sneak out of my sisters room. Every time I asked for them my mother would tell me they were ugly that we would go shopping to find something more beautiful,which we did at Wal-Mart. At the time of course I didn't realize that what my mother was doing tricking me into believing that a $5 dress was prettier than a $45 dress from Filenes. "It still had not dawned at me that my parents, especially mama, resolutely refused to acknowledge any difficulties woth money because her sense of shame aroumd class was deep and intense (p.28). This sentence stuck out to me because it depicts exactly how my mother must have felt as well. Working class people have been taught by society to be ashamed of themselves for not doing better, for not having the expensive material objects, for not "fitting in". The entire paragraph following that sentence reminded me of Tammy. In Tammy's case, she was not at all ashamed of how she was living, however her kids were. Later on in the reading we learn about the paintigs the girl drew and how loneliness was the main theme of them both. This truly depicts how lonely one can feel when they don't fit in to what society teaches us is "normal".
Belonging is a sensative issue we have discussed in class on more than one ocasion and is also discussed in this article. College is a completely new and scary experience for anyone, especially in this case where we see her going into an all womens college where the majority of the population is white, upper class women. She has two complete disadvatages here, one being a black woman and two being lower class. Although the girl has the intellgence to attend some of the best colleges and universities, she is lacking the social and economic capitol required to fit at any of these schools. Even with al the financial help the girl is able to take, she and her family realize that tuirion is not the only expense necesary in order to attend those elite colelges. Transportation, for instance is not covered in scholarships to attend elite schools. Another issue she runs into is not having the support of her family to relocate to attend a better college. Earlier in the semester we read an article about values within the working class community. One major point we discussed was how working class families stay close together so they can rely on one another in a time of need, for example multiple people living in one apartment of need be. "Mama explained that California was too far away, that it would always "cost" to get there, that if something went wrong they would not be able to come abd recue me, that I would not be able to come and rescue me, that i would not be able to come home for the holidays (p31)."These are the exact reasons working class people never venture out and explore what they are truly capable of, they are all afraid of being alone, away from their networks. I also got the feeling that mama might be a little threatened by her daughter's choice of moving on and making something of herself. We've discussed in class how woking class people also have a way of shaming people when they dedecide to move out of the "woking class" enviroment because they are now going to forget their "roots" or "where they came from" once there better than everyone else which i think is another reason why her parents were so unsupportive of her idea to attend Stanford.
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