Week 1: Introduction
Day 1 — Introduction
Watch film: Social Class in America (Knickerbocker Productions, 1957).
Watch “Wealth Inequality in America” (infographic video of a 2011 study by Michael Norton and Dan Ariely).
Day 2 – Defining Social Class (Note: Our discussion of poor and working-class frames might extend into the following Monday’s class.)
Prior to class, watch clips of Cops [1] [2]; Keeping up with the Kardashians – Thai orphanage
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] or, post your own discussion question or open-ended comment here.
For discussion in class: Does Shark Tankexemplify emulation framing?
Additional resource: On the Media’s “Busted: America’s Poverty Myths” (podcast series produced in 2016)
Powerpoint: Defining Social Class and Framing the Working Class and the Poor
Week 2 – Framing Class, continued
Day 1 – Framing the Middle Class
Diana Kendall, Framing Class, 121-208.
and Powerpoint: Framing the Middle Class
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4] – open topic or question
Day 2 – Appalachia project day 1
J.D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy. 2016. (excerpt).
Elizabeth Catte, “Passive, Poor, and White? What People Keep Getting Wrong about Appalachia,” The Guardian, Feb. 6, 2018.
Anthony Harkins, “Introduction: Race, Class, Popular Culture, and ‘the Hillbilly,’” in Hillbilly: A Cultural History of an American Icon. 2003. 3-12.
NO LONGER REQUIRED: Hillbilly (documentary, 2018). I will show clips in class. If you are interested, you can purchase the film on iTunes for $4.99 or watched for free if you have an Amazon Prime account
Powerpoint: Appalachia and the Hillbilly
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [post your own]
Week 3 – Workers in the Consumer’s Republic
Day 1 – Working-Class Housing and Consumerism after World War II
Barbara M. Kelly, “The Houses of Levittown in the Context of Postwar American Culture” (1995)
Allan Berube, “Sunset Trailer Park,” in Estelle B. Freedman and John D’Emilio, ed. My Desire for History : Essays in Gay, Community, and Labor History (UNC Press, 2011), 182-201.
Shelley Nickles, “More Is Better: Mass Consumption, Gender, and Class Identity in Postwar America,” American Quarterly 54, no. 4 (2002): 581–622.
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
Powerpoint: Class Dimensions of the Postwar American Dream
Personal narrative about social class — Due on Monday, February 25 at 11:59 PM.
Day 2 – Race, Class, and Popular Music
Szatmary, “Blues, Rock-and-Roll, and Racism” and “Elvis and Rockabilly” in Rockin’ in Time (Prentice Hall, 2000), 1-51.
Louis Jordan, “Ain’t Nobody Here but Us Chickens”
Bill Haley and the Comets, “Rock Around the Clock”
Elvis Presley, “That’s All Right Mama,” “Mystery Train,” “Blue Suede Shoes“
Little Richard, “Rip It Up” and “Tutti Frutti“
Fats Domino, “Blue Monday“
Davis Raines and Tricia Walker, “Poetry for the People: Country Music and American Social Change,” Southern Quarterly 45:2(Winter 2008), 44-52.
Merle Travis, “Divorce Me C.O.D.” “So Round, So Firm, So Fully Packed” (1947), “Sixteen Tons” (1946), “Dark as a Dungeon” (1946)
Hank Williams, “Mansion on the Hill”, “Men with Broken Hearts”, “A Tramp on the Street”
Kitty Wells, “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels” (1952)
Hank Thompson, “Six Pack To Go” (1960)
Recommended: “Class Politics, Country Music and Hillbilly Humanism [podcast segment]” On the Media, Oct. 6, 2017.
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]
Additional discussion question about “Class, Politics, Country Music and Hillbilly Humanism.”
Powerpoint: Race, Class, and Musical Ferment after World War II
Week 4 – Working-Class Television
Day 1 – Appalachia Project
Please peruse the topic possibilities on the Appalachia Project assignment page.
I think we need another day of common readings before deciding on small groups. Let’s read and discuss the following:
Annalee Newitz and Matthew Wray, “What Is ‘White Trash’? Stereotypes and Economic Conditions of Poor Whites in the U.S.” Minnesota Review 47(Fall 1996), 57-72.
Fessler, Pam. “In Appalachia, Poverty Is in the Eye of the Beholder.” NPR.org. Jan. 18, 2014.
Thompson, Aaron. “Stereotypes Of Appalachia Obscure A Diverse Picture.” NPR.org.
David Joy, “Digging in the Trash.” The Bitter Southerner (2019).
Katelyn Newman, “Hope for Change in Appalachia.” US News & World Report. Sept. 25, 2018.
Powerpoint: White Trash, Class Analysis, and Appalachia
Discussion Question [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [post your own]
Day 2 – Working-Class Television
Georganne Scheiner, “Would You Like to be Queen for a Day?: finding a working class voice in American television of the 1950s,” Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, 23:4(2003), 375-386.
Watch Queen for a Day (May 1958)
Steven T. Sheehan, “‘Pow! Right in the Kisser’’: Ralph Kramden, Jackie Gleason, and the Emergence of the Frustrated Working-Class Man,” The Journal of Popular Culture, 43:2(2010), 564-582.
The Honeymooners, “Head of the House,” March 31, 1956
Father Knows Best, “Family Dines Out,” March 28, 1956 (You don’t have to sign up for anything)
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
Powerpoint Presentation: Class and Early Network Television
Week 5 – Working-Class War / The Waning of the Post-WWII American Dream
Day 1 – Working-Class War
Ron Kovic, Born on the Fourth of July (1976), chapters 1 and 3.
Christian Appy, Working Class War (UNC Press, 1993), 11-43.
Woden Teachout, “Flag of Class: The Hard Hat Riot and the Vietnam War,” Capture the Flag: A Political History of American Patriotism (Basic Books, 2009), 173-205.
Richard Rogin, “Joe Kelly Reaches His Boiling Point” (1971).
Merle Haggard, “Okie from Muskogee”
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8]
Powerpoint: Class, Culture, and the Vietnam War
Day 2 – The Deindustrialization of America
Roger and Me (1989) — on reserve in the Davis Family Library and available for streaming on Amazon.
John Russo and Sherry Lee Linkon, “Collateral Damage: Deindustrialization and the Uses of Youngstown,” in Cowie and Heathcott, ed., Beyond the Ruins: The Meanings of Deindustrialization (2003), 201-218.
Jefferson Cowie and Lauren Boehm, “Dead Man’s Town: ‘Born in the U.S.A.,’ Social History, and Working-Class Identity,” American Quarterly 58:2 (Jun. 2006), 353-378.
Bruce Springsteen, “Born in the U.S.A.,” “Youngstown,” “Ghost of Tom Joad“
Jon Swaine, White, Working-class and Angry: Ohio’s Left-behind Help Trump to Stunning Win,” The Guardian (November 9, 2016).
Manfred B. Steger, “The Economic Dimension of Globalization,” Globalization : A Very Short Introduction (Oxford, 2003), 37-55.
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4]
Powerpoint: The Deindustrialization of America
Week 6 – The War on Welfare
Day 1 – Appalachia Project
Prior to class today, please review the Appalachia Project description and choose one or two topics that interest you. Please send me your topic ideas no later than 10:00 AM on Monday, March 18. In class, we will break into groups by topic and begin project planning.
Day 2- Propagating the Myth of the “Welfare Queen”
Precious (Lee Daniels, 2009) – on reserve at the Davis Family Library and available for streaming at Amazon.
Adriane Bezusko, “Criminalizing Black Motherhood: How the War on Welfare Was Won,” Souls 15:1-2(January 2013): 39-55.
Debra Henderson and Ann Tickamyer, “The Intersection of Poverty Discourses: Race, Class, Culture, and Gender,” in Bonnie Thornton Dill and Ruth Enid Zambrana, ed., Intersections: Race, Class, and Gender (Rutgers UP, 2010), 50-72.
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] — [1] [2] [3] [4]
Powerpoint: Welfare Policy, Practice, Racial Representation — Powerpoint: Neoliberalism and “the Culture of Poverty”: Race, Class, Gender, Region
Week 7 – Spring Vacation
Week 8 – The Housing Crisis
Day 1 — Poverty and the Housing Crisis
Matthew Desmond, Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City (2016), 1-110 (Prologue, ch. 1-8).
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10]
Powerpoint: Matthew Desmond’s Evicted
Please also read: Troy McMullen, “The ‘heartbreaking’ decrease in black homeownership,” Washington Post, February 28, 2019.
Day 2 — Eviction and Mass Incarceration
Evicted, 207-314 (chapters 17-24, Epilogue).
Please also read this excerpt from Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow (2012)
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
Powerpoint: Class, Race, and Caste in the New Jim Crow
Week 9 — Food and Social Inequality
Day 1 – Appalachia Project
Day 2 – Race, Class, and Food Politics
Harvest of Shame (CBS, Edward R. Murrow, 1960)
Food Chains (Sanjay Rawal, 2014) — currently accessible on youtube!
David Bacon, “The Story of Eulogio Solanoa: Photographs and Oral History,” New Labor Forum, 23:2 (Summer 2014), 84-91.
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4]
Powerpoint: Food, Farmworkers, and the U.S. Class Structure
Week 10 – The Disappearing Middle Class / Representing Privilege
Day 1 – Television and the Disappearing Middle Class
Holly Eagleson, “What Happened to All the Good Middle-Class Sitcoms?” Takepart, Feb. 25, 2015.
Joanna Weiss, “Why Won’t TV Show People Who Aren’t Rich?” Politico, Nov. 12, 2017.
Lynn C. Spangler, “Class on Television: Stuck in The Middle,” Journal of Popular Culture, 47:3(2014), 470-488.
Daniel D’Addario, “Modern Family is a class-blind fantasy world,” Salon.com, Sept. 24, 2013.
Watch an episode of The Middle (e.g., Season 1 pilot episode) and also Modern Family (e.g., S10 E19 Yes-Woman)
Lawrence R. Samuel, The American Middle Class: A Cultural History (Routledge, 2014), Kindle excerpt.
Powerpoint: Middle Class Today and on TV
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4]
Day 2 – Representing Privilege
In-class screening: Real Housewives of Atlanta / Real Housewives of New York City
Michael J. Lee and Leigh Moscowitz, “The ‘Rich Bitch’: Class and Gender on The Real Housewives of New York City,” in Gail Dines and Jean M. Humez, ed., Gender, Race, and Class in Media: A Critical Reader, 4th ed. (SAGE Publications, 2015), 143-156.
Real Housewives of New York City Season 6 Preview Special
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [post your own]
Powerpoint: Gender, Class, and Real Housewives
Week 11 – Contemporary Mediations of Social Class
Day 1 – Appalachia Project
Day 2 — Working-Class Reality TV
Lisa A. Kirby, “Cowboys of the High Seas: Representations of Working-Class Masculinity on Deadliest Catch,” The Journal of Popular Culture, 46:1 (2013), 109-118.
Gabriel Winant, “Dirty Jobs, Done Dirt Cheap: Working in Reality Television,” New Labor Forum, 23:3 (Fall 2014), 66-71.
Best of Deadliest Catch Season 13
Discussion Questions [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] – open topic or question
Powerpoint: Working-Class Masculinity and Reality TV
Week 12 – Class and Contemporary U.S. Politics
Day 1 – Class Politics in Trump’s America
Christine J. Walley, “Trump’s Election and the ‘White Working Class’: What We Missed,” American Ethnologist 44:2(2017), 231-236.
Paul Pierson, “American Hybrid: Donald Trump and the Strange Merger of Populism and Plutocracy,” The British Journal of Sociology 68:1(November 2017).
Jennifer Rubin, “The Trump Cabinet: Populists or Plutocrats?,” Washington Post, Dec 9, 2016.
Bring in an article about contemporary class politics to share with classmates.
Powerpoint: Trump: Champion of the White Working Class?
Day 2 – Appalachia Project Presentations – Day 1
Week 13 – Appalachia Projects / Course Conclusion
Day 1 – Appalachia Project Presentations – Day 2
Day 2 – Appalachia Project Presentations – Day 3
Powerpoint: Conclusion