Comments on: Rich People Things: Sonia Sotomayor, Clarence Thomas And The Trouble With The "Up From Poverty" Narrative http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/rich-people-things-sonia-sotomayor-and-the-trouble-with-the-up-from-poverty-narrative Seriously, this could not be more beta Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:14:51 -0400 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 hourly 1 By: RonMwangaguhunga http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/rich-people-things-sonia-sotomayor-and-the-trouble-with-the-up-from-poverty-narrative#comment-8378 RonMwangaguhunga Tue, 09 Jun 2009 21:37:42 +0000 http://www.theawl.com/?p=4810#comment-8378 Ah, The Manhattan Institute, which cloaks its enormous disregard for poor ethnics in the -- no pun intended -- black and white statistics of social science. Evil genius, on the real. Ah, The Manhattan Institute, which cloaks its enormous disregard for poor ethnics in the — no pun intended — black and white statistics of social science. Evil genius, on the real.

]]> By: Chris Lehmann http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/rich-people-things-sonia-sotomayor-and-the-trouble-with-the-up-from-poverty-narrative#comment-8376 Chris Lehmann Tue, 09 Jun 2009 21:35:49 +0000 http://www.theawl.com/?p=4810#comment-8376 Thesis, broadly speaking, is that lower-class origins are the first thing effaced in discussions of legal, academic, individual distinctions--so much so that a piece like Sunday's NYT entry appears to be addressing the (loose) affinities of social class in Sotomayor's and Thomas's background, only to recur to the more comforting (for journalists anwyay) discussion of race as the all-determining distinction. Of course, both S. and T. see themselves as determined largely by race-tinged experience (though it's a continual exapseration these days to see "Latina," a language-based category conflated with race, as though Spanish-speaking societies have no internal racial divisions). And meanwhile, in sulfuruous opinionating like the NYPost piece, class only finds expression as social pathology--there's no imaginable way for families in public housing to be honorable, unashamed social formations, for the simple reason that they're NOT RICH, even though the supposed ideal suburban model for individual achievement contains all sorts of hidden class-based subsidies that never enter into these discussions. Sort of involved points, I know, but I couldn't think of any simpler way to tackle the defiantly unempirical cast of these oversimplified success narratives. Especially on what the Awl pays. . . . Thesis, broadly speaking, is that lower-class origins are the first thing effaced in discussions of legal, academic, individual distinctions–so much so that a piece like Sunday's NYT entry appears to be addressing the (loose) affinities of social class in Sotomayor's and Thomas's background, only to recur to the more comforting (for journalists anwyay) discussion of race as the all-determining distinction. Of course, both S. and T. see themselves as determined largely by race-tinged experience (though it's a continual exapseration these days to see "Latina," a language-based category conflated with race, as though Spanish-speaking societies have no internal racial divisions).
And meanwhile, in sulfuruous opinionating like the NYPost piece, class only finds expression as social pathology–there's no imaginable way for families in public housing to be honorable, unashamed social formations, for the simple reason that they're NOT RICH, even though the supposed ideal suburban model for individual achievement contains all sorts of hidden class-based subsidies that never enter into these discussions.
Sort of involved points, I know, but I couldn't think of any simpler way to tackle the defiantly unempirical cast of these oversimplified success narratives. Especially on what the Awl pays. . . .

]]> By: sigerson http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/rich-people-things-sonia-sotomayor-and-the-trouble-with-the-up-from-poverty-narrative#comment-8262 sigerson Tue, 09 Jun 2009 16:54:41 +0000 http://www.theawl.com/?p=4810#comment-8262 So what is your thesis here? That Sotomayor and Thomas came from different classes and that explains a lot about their policy differences? Sorry, but I lost the plot somewhere in the discussion of school funding. Or do you just want to point out that people like Sotomayor and Thomas are distinctive not because of race but because of class? I think if you asked both of them, they would say that their racial background was paramount among all the other factors in their respective lives. So what is your thesis here? That Sotomayor and Thomas came from different classes and that explains a lot about their policy differences? Sorry, but I lost the plot somewhere in the discussion of school funding.

Or do you just want to point out that people like Sotomayor and Thomas are distinctive not because of race but because of class? I think if you asked both of them, they would say that their racial background was paramount among all the other factors in their respective lives.

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