Facing Up To The American Dream: Race, Class, And The Soul Of The Nation PDF

# Facing Up to the American Dream: Race, Class, and the Soul of the Nation. By Jennifer L. Hochschild. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995. * x + 412 pp. Illustrations, tables, notes, appendix, bibliography, and index. $29.95. - Hochschild argues that the American dream is in danger of be...

# Facing Up to the American Dream: Race, Class, and the Soul of the Nation. By Jennifer L. Hochschild. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995. * x + 412 pp. Illustrations, tables, notes, appendix, bibliography, and index. $29.95. - Hochschild argues that the American dream is in danger of being abandoned because of critical racial and class factors. - The book is based upon two very controversial claims. - The first "is that the American dream is and has been for decades, if not for centuries, a central ideology of Americans." She defines the American dream as "not merely the right to get rich, but rather the promise that all Americans have a reasonable chance to achieve success as they define it - material or otherwise - through their own efforts, and to attain virtue and fulfillment through success" (p. xi). - The second claim "is that the ideology of the American dream faces a serious challenge" because of the racial divide between blacks and whites: "too often whites and blacks see a barrier, if not an enemy, when they look at each other" (p. xi). The most serious challenge to the dream is that blacks' growing dissatisfaction with the dream might be imitated by whites. "If whites come to view the dream for themselves as blacks are increasingly coming to view the dream for themselves, the ideology and the society based on it will be threatened" (p. xii). The dream can only succeed if people believe in it. And, according to Hochschild, there is "no alternative for the United States that is both plausible and preferable" (p. xii). - Hochschild focuses on how well the American dream has worked for African Americans in the real world. - Using an impressive array of methodological sources including census data, opinion polls, ethnographies and letters to the editor, she meticulously examines three paradoxes related to claims of the American dream. - The first paradox "revolves around the fact that blacks and whites live in the same society, have experienced the same history, are affected by the same political and economic events, and yet see the world in sharply and increasingly different ways" (p. 8). For example, there can be no doubt, according to Hochschild, that "African Americans are in many, but not all, ways better off than their forebears were. Whether they are better off in comparison to white Americans depends on what is measured and how it is measured." Poor African Americans, however, are growing poorer. Many affluent African Americans and their white counterparts disagree on how much African Americans have progressed. Whites feel that blacks have made much progress, and blacks feel that they have made only relative progress. Middle-class blacks feel that racism is increasing, and their white counterparts feel that racism is decreasing, that blacks have the same opportunity to participate in the American dream as they do, and the failure of blacks to do so is their own fault. - The second paradox is based on the fact that "as people become richer they do not in any simple way become happier or more gratified with their lives." As the black middle class has expanded and become more stable, many of its members have "grown disillusioned with and even embittered about the American dream." - The third paradox stems from the fact that as many people become poorer they do not necessarily reject the American dream. In contrast to the disillusionment of the black middle class, many poor blacks continue to have faith in that dream. - Understanding these paradoxes is crucial for the future viability of the American dream among poor and rich blacks and poor and rich whites. - The first paradox can be partially explained by the fact that much of black progress over the last three decades has been mixed. Disparities within the black population are "now vastly greater than they used to be and are arguably so great that well-off and poor blacks live in vastly different worlds" (p. 4). This is one reason why many middle-class blacks feel that racism is still a factor. However, many whites see only the relative progress of the black middle class and wonder, "what's all the fuss about?" - Hochschild explains the second paradox by pointing out that, "unlike whites, for whom socio-economic status is closely associated with subjective quality of life, blacks do not express greatest happiness or more satisfaction as their economic positions improve." She also points out that middle-class blacks feel "their lives [are] more problematic than do middle-class whites" (p. 93). One key reason is because they are more vulnerable to political and economic changes. According to Hochschild, middle-class blacks also identify more with less well-off members of their race than do middle-class whites. Middle-class blacks tend to view the American dream as “selfish individualism.” # Feasts and Celebrations in North American Ethnic Communities. - Edited by Ramon A. Gutiérrez and Genevieve Fabre. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995. xiv + 195 pp. Figures, notes, and index. $30.00. - This work is essentially a collection of eleven revised English language papers given at an international conference held in Paris in 1989, at the Bicentennial of the French Revolution. - Its purpose was to show the importance of festivals and parades as "total social facts" expressing the sentiments of its ethnic participants under three general categories. They are spectacles as resistance; rituals of renewal and return; and celebrations as creations of identities. - Overall, the essays are of high quality and hence do successfully show the salience of using celebrations as an invaluable avenue of investigation for immigration historians. However, as is so often the case with edited collections, the structure of the volume is not as uniform as the editors suggest. Some contributions are more relevant to ethnic historians than others. - Two outstanding essays most clearly relate to the topical theme. - One is the article under identity creation by Guyette and Posadas, who from solid research highlight the transformation among Filipino Americans of their celebrations of their national hero, Rizal. - Another is the piece by Alessandra Lorini, who shows the oppression of African Americans through two New York City events, the Erie Canal celebration of 1827 and the 1909 Hudson Fulton Centennial. - The book does have several essays whose ethnic content is questionable, such as Jack Kugelmass's piece on the contemporary Halloween celebration in Greenwich Village and an article on white Southerners. While covered in the Paris conference, white ethnic groups are regrettably absent in the book, an omission that wrongly suggests festivals are unimportant to them. Finally, the design of the work is also deficient in terms of the unreadable type font used and its omission of visuals, a requirement for such a study.