White Trash

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In her groundbreaking history of the class system in America, extending from colonial times to the present, Nancy Isenberg takes on our comforting myths about equality, uncovering the crucial legacy of the ever present, always embarrassing if occasionally entertaining poor white trash The wretched and landless poor have existed from the time of the earliest British colonial settlement They were alternately known as waste people, offals, rubbish, lazy lubbers, and crackers By the 1850s, the downtrodden included so called clay eaters and sandhillers, known for prematurely aged children distinguished by their yellowish skin, ragged clothing, and listless minds.Surveying political rhetoric and policy, popular literature and scientific theories over four hundred years, Isenberg upends assumptions about America s supposedly class free society where liberty and hard work were meant to ensure real social mobility Poor whites were central to the rise of the Republican Party in the early nineteenth century, and the Civil War itself was fought over class issues nearly as much as it was fought over slavery.Reconstruction pitted poor white trash against newly freed slaves, which factored in the rise of eugenics a widely popular movement embraced by Theodore Roosevelt that targeted poor whites for sterilization These poor were at the heart of New Deal reforms and LBJ s Great Society they haunt us in reality TV shows like Here Comes Honey Boo Booand Duck Dynasty. Marginalized as a class, white trash have always been at or near the center of major political debates over the character of the American identity.We acknowledge racial injustice as an ugly stain on our nation s history With Isenberg s landmark book, we will have to face the truth about the enduring, malevolent nature of class as well. Best Read White Trash by Nancy Isenberg For Kindle ePUB or eBook – kino-fada.fr The white poor have been with us in various guises, as the names they have been given across centuries attest Waste people Offscourings Lubbers Bogtrotters Rascals Rubbish Squatters Crackers Clay eaters Tackies Mudsills Scalawags Briar hoppers Hillbillies Low downers White niggers Degenerates White trash Rednecks Trailer trash Swamp people My mom was always rather class conscious I d make a new friend at school, and the first thing my mother would do was go through my new The white poor have been with us in various guises, as the names they have been given across centuries attest Waste people Offscourings Lubbers Bogtrotters Rascals Rub...All history is the history of class struggle Sound familiar It should Well, the actual quote from, Karl Marx and Frederick Engels Communist Manifesto, is The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles Doesn t have quite the same ring, but it gets the job done, however transmogrified it might have been in popular recollection and various translations And it may or not be the case Certainly in America one is considered suspect for subscribing to the notio All history is the history of class struggle Sound familiar It should Well, the...If this book accomplishes anything it will be to have exposed a number of myths about the American dream, to have disabused readers of the notion that upward mobility is a function of the founders ingenious plan Nancy Isenberg s White Trash The 400 Year Untold History of Class in America is a tour de force of research and hard hitting assessments of our country s attitude toward the poor and shiftless masses It delves into the historical inaccuracies and missteps of a nation, our nationIf this book accomplishes anything it will be to have exposed a number of myths about the American dream, to have disabused readers of the notion that upward mobility is a function of the founders ingenious plan Nancy Isenberg s White Trash The 400 Year Untold History of Class in America is a tour de force of research and hard hitting assessments of our country s attitude toward the poor and shiftless masses It delves into the historical inaccura...In All the King s Men, Robert Penn s classic novel of American politics, the protagonist is Willie Stark, the demagogic and corrupt governor of an unnamed state Willie is based on Huey Long of Louisiana The tragedy of Willie and All the King s Men is an archetypal tragedy is that he started out as a good man He was a backcountry bumpkin who managed to rise out of poverty to become an idealistic young lawyer Willie runs for County Treasurer promising transparency and honesty He loses to In All the King s Men, Robert Penn s classic novel of American politics, the protagonist is Willie Stark, the demagogic and corrupt governor of an unnamed state Willie is based on Huey Long of Louisiana The tragedy of Willie and All the King s Men is an archetypal tragedy is that he started out as a good man He was a backcountry bumpkin who managed to rise out of poverty to become an idealistic young lawyer Willie runs for County Treasurer promising transparency and honesty He loses to the establishment candidate, a man known for corruption and self dealing The man who beats Willie accepts a low bid to build a school, taking a kickb...While reading this extraordinary history of the white underclass in America, I was reminded of how much of my life was spent in and around house trailers I m not talking about those doublewide, wannabe condos with designer touches, landscaped lawns, and air conditioned club houses a short golf cart ride away I m talking about 10 12 feet wide, 60 80 feet long pill shaped homes that still have the tires attached My mom and dad brought me home to such a trailer when I was born Almost all of my While reading this extraordinary history of the white underclass in America, I was reminded of how much of my life was spent in and around house trailers I m not talking about those doublewide, wannabe condos with designer touches, landscaped lawns, and air conditioned club houses a short golf cart ride away I m talking about 10 12 feet wide, 60 80 feet long pill shaped homes that still have the tires attached My mom and dad brought me home to such a trailer when I was born Alm...This was a fascinating history from beginning to end, maybeso because this history has not entirely played out In White Trash The 400 Year Untold History of Class in America, Nancy Isenberg shows the ways in which Americans have both recognized and embodied the lower classes of our society This bottom rung of American society has variously been denigrated as waste people, offals, lubbers, clay eaters, rednecks, hillbillies and perhaps most famously, white trash The examination of white This was a fascinating history from beginning to end, maybeso because this history has not entirely played out In White Trash The 400 Year Untol...Of the good Isenberg argues that we do not give the history of poor whites nearly the due it deserves, and makes a striking claim for the centrality of that history to any understanding of the United States It s a provocative position, and one that she makes good with following her train of thought from the colonial period to the present day, it s clear that we are a nation obsessed with class distinctions, peddling a mythology of the exact opposite.Of the not so good Isenberg does not give Of the good Isenberg argues that we do not give the history of poor whites nearly the due it deserves, and makes a striking claim for the centrality of that history to...2.5 star to be fair It s written poorly, first of all It could easily have been edited to half of its size for the pure information it contained in total It s verbose and with immense repetition of basically what is a colonist theory detailing to origins of present class barriers in the USA As if the point that there ARE definitive class bars and levels within the USA and that it is not a classless society just because it is a republic is some kind of epiphany It s hard for me to imagine an 2.5 star to be fair It s written poorly, first of all It could easily have been edited to half of its size for the pure information it contained in total It s verb...This book could easily be the only American history book that one would need to read to gain a greater understanding on the socio economic problems in America I m not sure how I found it, but this book is one of the most informative books that I will probably read this year Because of this book, I refuse to have any discussions about racism in the United States unless the conversation includes a willingness to take a historical step back understand how classism capitalism has fai This book could easily be the only American history book that one would need to read to gain a greater understanding on the socio economic problems in America I m not sure how I found it, but this book is one of the most informative books that I will probably read this year Because of this book, I refuse to h...Nancy Isenberg s tome on the history of poor whites in America is expansive and thorough Starting with the earliest colonists and progressing to modern day America, she illuminates the somewhat hidden history of poor white families in their many incarnations over the past four centuries Spoiler alert rich white men have always hated poor white men only slightly less than they hate brown people.While I must respect the research and effort that went into this volume, I admit that it was very ha Nancy Isenberg s tome on the history of poor whites in America is expansive and thorough Starting with the earliest colonists and progressing to modern day America, she illuminates the somewhat hidden history of poor white families in their many incarnations over the past four centuries Spoiler alert rich white men have always hated poor white men only slightly les...

White Trash
  • English
  • 07 August 2018
  • Hardcover
  • 460 pages
  • 0670785970
  • Nancy Isenberg
  • White Trash