Class Matters: Working Class Women's Perspectives on Social Class

✍ Scribed by Pat Mahony; Christine Zmroczek

• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Year: 2005
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 219
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This text focuses on the theory of class as it relates to women. It debates questions such as: how do women define themselves in terms of social class and why?; is definition important or not?; what part does education play in our understanding of class?; and how does class affect relationships?

✦ Table of Contents

Book Cover
Title
Copyright
Contents
Chapter 1 Why Class Matters
References
Chapter 2 Class Matters, ‘Race’ Matters, Gender Matters
Introduction
Identifying Differences in Constructions of Black and White Womanhood
(Re)contextualizing Social Class, ‘Race’ and Gender
(Mis)representations of Black Womanhood
Reconciling My Educational Experiences and Social Class Position
Conclusion
Notes
References
Chapter 3 The Double-Bind of the ‘Working-Class’ Feminist Academic: The Success of Failure or the Failure of Success?
Notes
References
Chapter 4 Women, Education and Class: The Relationship Between Class Background and Research
Introduction
Influences on My Own Education
Early Memories
Extended Family and the Neighbourhood
Immediate Family Influences
Domestic Responsibilities
Into Work
Returning to Learning
A Growing Interest in Mature Student Issues
Back to Higher Education
Links with the Research
The Women’s Stories
Jenny
Dilys
Sheila
Heather
Overview
Conclusion
References
Chapter 5 Academic as Anarchist: Working-Class Lives into Middle-Class Culture
Books
Working for a Living
Writing the Working-Class Heroine
Conclusion
Note
References
Chapter 6 Something Vaguely Heretical: Communicating across Difference in the Country
Introduction
Karen’s Letter
Gail’s Letter
Conclusion
Notes
Chapter 7 ‘You’re not with your common friends now’: Race and Class Evasion in 1960s London
Notes
References
Chapter 8 Contested Categorizations: Auto/Biography, Narrativity and Class
Introduction
Lack of Fit?
Pedigree and Audience
Discussion
References
Chapter 9 Missing Links: Working-Class Women of Irish Descent
Difficult Questions—Different Selves
Women: Outsiders Still in the Academy
The Cultural Habitus of Irish Catholicity—Home and School
A Working-Class Women of Irish Descent in the Academy
Speaking Ourselves: Women in the Academy
References
Chapter 10 Switching Cultures
References
Chapter 11 A Class of One’s Own: Women, Social Class and the Academy
Introduction
Getting It Right
Identity Politics
Feelings of Fraudulence: Theorizing Internalized Oppression
Insiders/Outsiders
Being in the Right Place at the Right Time
Healing Ourselves
Note
References
Chapter 12 Classifying Practices: Representations, Capitals and Recognitions
Representations and Classifications
Class Forms: Forms of Capital
Wrong Capitals and ‘Structures of Feelings’
Conclusions
Notes
References
Chapter 13 Northern Accent and Southern Comfort: Subjectivity and Social Class
Introduction: Sound Bites (1)
Social Class and the Dialectics of Dialect: Sound Bites (2)
‘Voice Over’
Class and Gender Locations: Contract Cultures
Locations and Dis/Locations: The New Politics of Subjectivity
Notes
References
Chapter 14 Interpreting Class: Auto/Biographical Imaginations and Social Change
Introduction
Class Feeling/Class Healing
Hybridity and Ambiguity: Class and Gender Tensions
Education: Glimpsing Class and Gender
Feminism: For Better, For Worse, For Good
Bundles for Healing
Notes
References
Chapter 15 To Celeb-rate and Not to Be-moan
Why Politically Active?
Pageant and Physicality: The Creative Culture of Progressive Movements
My Trail of Bunting
First Flag: Youth Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
Second Flag: Women’s Liberation Movement (WLM)
Third Flag: Union Women
Fourth Flag: Within the Communist Party
Fifth Flag (The Boldest): Revolution Enacted
Sixth Flag: Community Publishing
Seventh Flag: The Educated Working-Class Women’s Group
Eighth Flag: SWOMP
Conclusion/The End of the Bunting
Notes
References
Chapter 16 Finding a Voice: On Becoming a Working-Class Feminist Academic
Thinking about Class
Growing Up Working-Class
On Being a Working-Class Feminist Academic
References
Notes on Contributors
Index