Bell Hooks Seeing And Making Culture Representing The Poor Summary

In a New York Times article, “Too Poor to Make the News,” author Barbara Ehrenreich focuses on the impact the recession has caused to the lives of the working poor. She begins her article by describing how the newly group, known as Nouveau poor, have to give up valuables where as the working poor have to give up housing, food, and prescription medicines. Ehrenreich’s purpose is to inform her readers who are blessed enough not to suffer like the working poor. Barbara Ehrenreich’s article examines the impacts the recession has on the lives of the working poor, by demonstrating pathos, and makes readers aware of the sufferings the poor have to face. Barbara Ehrenreich examines the aspects that are impacting the working poor from the recession.

Seeing and making culture: representing the poor by Bell Hooks, is a hard look at the way the higher class and lower class see the poor. The essay was written by the way Hooks seen how the higher class had prejudices towards the lower class. Gloria Watkins, or Bell Hook as she is known in her writings is a prominent colored scholar her topics range from race to gender and even some politics. Her child hood helped her to write the essay, seeing and making culture: representing the poor. As a child of disadvantaged background, her father worked for the local post office as a janitor in a small Kentucky town.

In Holtzman Chapter 3, I found it interesting how the author points out that the poorest neighborhoods, example used being Compton, CA, will have more than triple the interest rates on a short term loan than that of a not so poor neighborhood. My reaction when reading this was one of sadness, but also one of anger as I thought of a few things. You would think first off that the poorest neighborhoods would have mostly state government housing (here in South Dakota it is called Section 8 housing) to where things like a home loan wouldn’t be needed, but then you would also think there would be rules on this lending practice that would make it illegal for someone to jack up the interest rates on a home? I also enjoyed reading the section where the author used different phrases from John Scalzi to bring home the point that we don’t always understand what the poor goes through, and sometimes maybe it is even hard for us to describe.

Rebecca Skloot develops the idea that poverty comes with many difficult situations, in the book, "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks". True, Henrietta and her family were poor, could barely afford their medical bills, and they didn 't get the extended care that they deserved. You will learn how being poor can change your life and what is done with it . In the book, Henrietta 's daughter, Deborah, has many medical problems and she has to spend all her money on not even all her medicine.

On page 107, Oscar Lewis mentions how the culture-of-poverty is one which arises from existing situations and becomes a “design for living”.

In the article “How I Discovered the Truth about Poverty” Barbara Ehrenreich gives her view in poverty and explains why she think Michael Harington’s book “The Other American” gives a wrong view on poverty. She explained that Harrington believes that the poor thought and felt differently and what divides the poor was their different “culture of poverty.” Ehrenreich goes on to explain on how the book that became a best seller caused so many bad stereotypes on the poor that by the Reagan era poverty was seen as “bad attitudes” and “faulty lifestyles” and not by the lack of jobs or low paying jobs. And they also viewed the poor as “Dissolute, promiscuous, prone to addiction and crime, unable to “defer gratification,” or possibly even set an alarm clock.”

In “Learning in the Shadow of Race and Class”, Bell Hooks describes her feeling that relate to race , class , and education . The article shows us that race and class are two of the leading factors to perdition between humans. Bell describes the hard times that she faced in her life . In the beginning of the article , Bell talks about the relationship between desire and shame . Because her parents could not afford her desires they told her that she did not need them and shamed her into not wanting them.

No Nickels or Dimes To Spare In the book, Nickel and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich writes the story, “Serving in Florida.” She describes her experience living as an undercover waitress when in reality she’s a journalist for culture and politics with a doctorate in biology. Ehrenreich experiences trying to survive on multiple low income jobs to understand what it is like to be in their shoes instead of being apart of the higher middle class.

The novel, The American Way of Poverty: How the Other Half Still Lives by Sasha Abramsky is about how he traveled the United States meeting the poor. The stories he introduces in novel are articles among data-driven studies and critical investigations of government programs. Abramsky has composed an impressive book that both defines and advocates. He reaches across a varied range of concerns, involving education, housing and criminal justice, in a wide-ranging view of poverty 's sections. In considering results, it 's essential to understand how the different problems of poor families intermingle in mutual reinforcement.

Furthermore, she addresses a common misconception among Americans, that those living in poverty are not hard working people,

Approximately 48,472,800 Americans live in poverty: 15.2% of the population. Poverty is clearly an ongoing issue in today’s society. Many people today look down upon, and think badly of, those who are impoverished. Intolerance of poverty is an attitude held by most characters in “The Jacket”. These attitudes reflect the current intolerance towards poverty and persist throughout the story.

In the passage “What is poverty?”, the author Jo Goodwin Parker, describes a variety of things that she considers to portray the poverty in which she lives in. She seems to do this through her use of first-person point of view to deliver a view of poverty created by a focused use of rhetorical questions, metaphors, imagery, and repetition to fill her audience with a sense of empathy towards the poor. The author’s use of first person point of view creates the effect of knowing exactly what she is feeling. “The baby and I suffered on. I have to decide every day if I can bear to put my cracked hands into the cold water and strong soap.”

As a reader reads Barbara Ehrenreich’s book Nickel and Dimed on (Not) Getting by in America, they get an insight on what it is like to live a low income life. Ehrenreich proposes the argument in the introduction that poverty is a serious matter and just because one has a job does not mean they are not considered poor. She wants to persuade us to realize that American is not the land of opportunity as promised and portrayed and there are regular people who are struggling to live a comfortable life. Throughout her book she mentions her experiences with living on minimum wage, the hiring process, and how she felt being put in that position. After reading Ehrenreich’s book I am thoroughly persuaded.

Poverty and discrimination affects both main characters but in different ways. Richard is ashamed of the pity he is getting and Maleeka is bullied because of what she wears. Both feelings will stay with the main character for the rest of their lives and that's what truly arises emotion in the reader. Richard was so determined to prove he had money, he told his class he would donate 15 dollars to the cause. If he had 15 dollars he probably would have given them in rather than buying himself the food he desperately needs to survive.

The author, Matthew Desmond visited Milwaukee to live with under privileged families to see how the eviction process takes place in America. Informing society and telling a first had experience that involved, evidence, research, and passion. With this in mind, he then wants to educate the public on how society can change and make poverty less of an issue in America today. Desmond uses living with these poor families, watching the struggle, kids suffer, and then eventually get evicted, as evidence.