Participants are asked to take a step forward--in this case a virtual one--for each statement that is true for them. Below, I have bolded the statements that are true for me.
Take a step:
If your father went to college before you started
If your father finished college before you started
If your mother went to college before you started
If your mother finished college before you started
If you have any relative who is an attorney, physician, or professor.
If your family was the same or higher class than your high school teachers
If you had a computer at home when you were growing up (To be fair, in the 70s and 80s, home computers weren't as ubiquitous)
If you had your own computer at home when you were growing up
If you had more than 50 books at home when you were growing up
If you had more than 500 books at home when you were growing up (Unsure about this one)
If were read children's books by a parent when you were growing up
If you ever had lessons of any kind as a child or a teen
If you had more than two kinds of lessons as a child or a teen
If the people in the media who dress and talk like you were portrayed positively
If you had a credit card with your name on it before college
If you had or will have less than $5000 in student loans when you graduate
If you had or will have no student loans when you graduate
If you went to a private high school
If you went to summer camp
If you had a private tutor
(US students only) If you have been to Europe more than once as a child or teen
(International question) If you have been to the US more than once as a child or teen
If your family vacations involved staying at hotels rather than KOA or at relatives homes
If all of your clothing has been new
If your parents gave you a car that was not a hand-me-down from them
If there was original art in your house as a child or teen
If you had a phone in your room
If your parent owned their own house or apartment when you were a child or teen
If you had your own room as a child or teen
If you participated in an SAT/ACT prep course
If you had your own cell phone in High School (Again, not so much with the fancy technology in the mid 80s)
If you had your own TV as a child or teen
If you opened a mutual fund or IRA in High School or College
If you have ever flown anywhere on a commercial airline
If you ever went on a cruise with your family
If your parents took you to museums and art galleries as a child or teen
If you were unaware of how much heating bills were for your family
What this exercise underscores for me is that I--a black woman in America--have been very privileged, despite sexism and racism. While I certainly can congratulate myself for the good decisions I've made along the course of my life, I should be honest about how my class privilege has given me a leg up. Certainly, my middle class background has made it easier for me to transcend the stigma of my race and gender. Conversely, a black woman raised in poverty has a steeper mountain to climb. I don't think anyone reading this is unaware of the important role that class plays in this country, but sometimes it is useful to have a quick reminder of where you stand.
Something to note: A number of bloggers have discussed this meme and pointed out the biases inherent in the questions. Racial bias is especially apparent in the social class knowledge quiz (link above) that includes questions about Nascar and Bill Engvall, two markers of the white working class that mean nothing to a lot of people of color. There is also some age bias to be aware of, given that the exercise was created on a modern college campus. Questions about computers and cell phones are not particularly relevant to me as a Generation Xer and less relevant to Baby Boomers and others.
Check out LaToya's post on Racialicious.
Visit Rachel's Tavern.
Stop by Education and Class for criticism of bloggers' responses to the Privilege Meme.
Also, stop by the Quaker Class blog that started it all.
12 comments:
Thanks for stopping by my blog. I'm glad people are starting to talk about class more broadly. I also wonder when the issue of class will come up in discussions about racism, because some of what people call racism is really classism. In another discussion in the Quaker blogosphere about the wording of a sign in the window, one African American person said it would be a block to his peers because of the "high" English and dry form.
I would say the same for white working class people.
So is the issue really about race? Or is it the common issue of class?
I took a workshop last year on classism among Quakers and we watched the film Crash with a class lens on. Previously, I'd seen Crash several times and noticed only the racism issues. After the workshop, I understood very clearly how racism and classism not only are intertwined, they support each other.
Jeanne
Hi Tami,
I don't think this is racially biased so much as culturally biased.
If one concedes that this is racially based that would equate being Black or non-White with being poor.
I think there are more White people in America who did not have access to the things listed than Black people.
The point of the exercise is that it was made to examine who has access to the things many people in certain parts of the White community find important.
With that said many African Americans also indulge their kids in the things listed.
So using this as a discussion about race shows the inherent racist nature of those who authored this research.
Even class cannot be determined by this measure. I have known many people who could not or would not let their children participate in some of these things who by some standards including mine, were certainly of a more privileged class.
Also class and privilege are measured in different ways in different communities. A teacher in the Black community has often been considered middle or even upper middle class.
Wealth is not and has not been the standard by which Black people judged each other in terms of class.
This study seems to have been done by people who are culturally illiterate.
I don't know, MDC. Despite the efforts of people of color, doesn't the mainstream make the rules of class distinction simply because they are the mainstream?
I guess what I mean is that if the things on this list are things that the white majority find important, and for the most part white people define who is upper class, then whether black people agree with these markers or not, won't we be faced with them?
As an example, I never traveled to Europe as a child. When I worked in the corporate sphere with a lot of upper-middle and upper-class white women, many of them had traveled to Europe. It was a point of similarity they shared that I was separated from. My family, comprised of a principal, a teacher and three kids, may have appeared middle- or upper-middle class in the black community--we were members of Jack and Jill and my mom is a Link--but those things mean very little as status markers in the larger world.
Did that make any sense?
You know the more I think about it, maybe this exercise is more a predictor of privilege than class, meaning it is an indicator of the advantages that you may or may not have had throughout your life.
Tami,
"we were members of Jack and Jill and my mom is a Link--but those things mean very little as status markers in the larger world."
Au contraire mon ami! I think that being a member of those organizations can be an extraordinary help in ones life.
It just depends on how you choose to navigate the world. Being associated with either of those groups can afford you great access in the professional world.
The fact that most non-African Americans are not familiar with them actually may work to your advantage.
I doubt that there is a major company in this country that doesn't have someone from one of those organizations in a position to help other members.
My point is we have our own standards. If we choose to ignore them and simply assimilate then we are definitely at a disadvantage.
It's up to us to put ourselves in positions that whatever resources we have personally work to our benefit.
The problem is in many cases we think that the resources of the larger society are legitimate and ours aren't.
We define who we are unless we let others define us. This exercise is an attempt to define us by someone else’s standard.
I reject it.
"We define who we are unless we let others define us. This exercise is an attempt to define us by someone else’s standard."
Yup - you got it. This experience, based on published research, is about what large numbers of people think about privilege. That's it. Our desire was to give people a point of comparison. We all have a social class of origin, a current felt social class, and an attributed social class. This experience is one way to explore the difference between what we believe about ourselves and what others believe about us.
Of course we define ourselves and of course how others perceive you is their business.
. . . and no, the people who designed this experience, not research, are not culturally illiterate. We are quite a mixed group.
Will
MDC, I understand where you are coming from. I disagree, but I respect it.
I saw this exercise not as an attempt to assess my class status, but in part as a way to make participants examine their own privilege. Will might correct me on this, though.
I find it interesting that a lot of "haves" attribute their success solely to their own goodness and hard work. And there is a sense that "have nots" are in their position because of lack of goodness and hard work. Oh, people say that they don't really believe that, but I think way too many people do. I debate with two guys at work about it all the time.
What I find interesting about reaction to the exercise across the Web is this from the Education and Class blog:
"One the one hand, nearly everyone in this current round of posts denies that they are privileged, regardless of their family circumstances (”Original art on our walls? Well, it’s not as if we had to pay for it! My parents were friends with many artists!”). Very, very few of the hundreds of people who are participating in this have simply said “well yeah, I was really privileged growing up and I’ve always understood that.”
On the other hand, many of these writers simply assume — and often viciously assert — that they and their families are “better” than people who did not grow up with the sorts of things on the list, because any parents who worked hard and cared about their kids would obviously provide the same things that they, themselves, enjoyed as children."
I think it is this attitude that keeps us from addressing poverty in this country in a real way.
I took my results as a reminder of what I already knew: I have been very lucky and have had many advantages in my life. I didn't earn many of these advantages; I got them by chance, by virtue of the family to which I was born. I haven't had everything, and I have worked damn hard to make the most of those advantages, but I need to be thankful for what I've been given and mindful that not everyone has enjoyed the same privileges.
My childhood was relatively comfortable. I went to private/parochial school. I went to summer camp (even though it was the regular camp, not sleepaway). My father is a doctor and my mother is the business manager in his office. My dad is college educated and my mom is not. My only problem with the criteria is that they are somewhat culturally biased. I also think there is a tendency in our society to equate poverty with blackness even though most poor people in America are white.
The experience is culturally biased to reflect the dominant culture's notions about privilege. Other cultures will value things differently and value different things.
There is an real problem when people equate African-American and poor and then blame poor people for their being poor without looking at the systems of privilege, education, banking, language, real estate, and what not that help reproduce our current class structure.
Jane Van Galen's excellent 2000 article in Multicultural Education points out clearly how education reproduces our class structure while many politicians claim that education is for opportunity and access.
I enjoy seeing how Ms Clinton is playing the class card, talking about the invisible majority. This is a time honored practice and worked before (Nixon, see the Rolling Stone article on this). Unless we 'foreground' class (to use Van Galen's term, all this injustice will continue.
The experience is culturally biased to reflect the dominant culture's notions about privilege. Other cultures will value things differently and value different things.
There is an real problem when people equate African-American and poor and then blame poor people for their being poor without looking at the systems of privilege, education, banking, language, real estate, and what not that help reproduce our current class structure.
Jane Van Galen's excellent 2000 article in Multicultural Education points out clearly how education reproduces our class structure while many politicians claim that education is for opportunity and access.
I enjoy seeing how Ms Clinton is playing the class card, talking about the invisible majority. This is a time honored practice and worked before (Nixon, see the Rolling Stone article on this). Unless we 'foreground' class (to use Van Galen's term, all this injustice will continue.
This experience was culturally biased toward what the majority culture sees as privilege. Different cultural groups see things differently and see different things.
The intersection of ethnicity and class is very complicated. Which identity comes first. Am I an upper middle class European-American or a European-American who is upper middle class?
Ethnicity and gender have advocacy groups who do great work and who have a vested interest in not 'diluting the dialog'. Who are the advocates for class?
It is interesting to use a class lens when paying attention to the US Presidential rhetoric and image posing. It is interesting that President Bush, an Ivy League New England guy, was re-classed as a Texas cowboy for his election run.
Interesting. I'm white and only 4 of these were true for me, but then, I was born poverty class.
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