具体描述
In her groundbreaking bestselling history of the class system in America, Nancy Isenberg upends histroy as we know it by taking on our comforting myths about equality and uncovering the crucial legacy of the ever-present, always embarrassing—if occasionally entertaining—poor white trash.
“When you turn an election into a three-ring circus, there’s always a chance that the dancing bear will win,” says Isenberg of the political climate surrounding Sarah Palin. And we recognize how right she is today. Yet the voters boosting Trump have been a permanent part of our American fabric, argues Isenberg.
The wretched and landless poor have existed from the time of the earliest British colonial settlement to today's hillbillies. They were alternately known as “waste people,” “offals,” “rubbish,” “lazy lubbers,” and “crackers.” By the 1850s, the downtrodden included so-called “clay eaters” and “sandhillers,” known for prematurely aged children distinguished by their yellowish skin, ragged clothing, and listless minds.
Surveying political rhetoric and policy, popular literature and scientific theories over four hundred years, Isenberg upends assumptions about America’s supposedly class-free society––where liberty and hard work were meant to ensure real social mobility. Poor whites were central to the rise of the Republican Party in the early nineteenth century, and the Civil War itself was fought over class issues nearly as much as it was fought over slavery. Reconstruction pitted poor white trash against newly freed slaves, which factored in the rise of eugenics–-a widely popular movement embraced by Theodore Roosevelt that targeted poor whites for sterilization. These poor were at the heart of New Deal reforms and LBJ’s Great Society; they haunt us in reality TV shows like Here Comes Honey Boo Boo and Duck Dynasty. Marginalized as a class, white trash have always been at or near the center of major political debates over the character of the American identity.
We acknowledge racial injustice as an ugly stain on our nation’s history. With Isenberg’s landmark book, we will have to face the truth about the enduring, malevolent nature of class as well.
作者简介
Nancy Isenberg is the author of Fallen Founder: The Life of Aaron Burr, which was a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize in Biography and won the Oklahoma Book Award for best book in Nonfiction. She is the coauthor, with Andrew Burstein, of Madison and Jefferson. She is the T. Harry Williams Professor of American History at LSU, and writes regularly for Salon.com. Isenberg is the winner of the 2016 Walter & Lillian Lowenfels Criticism Award from the Before Columbus Foundation. She lives in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and Charlottesville, Virginia.
目录信息
读后感
A chronical retell of the history of america from the perspective of the class struggle. The author put most emphasis on white underclass, so called "white trash", while white elites, black underclass are also touched upon. Events, public figures, and cultu...
评分A chronical retell of the history of america from the perspective of the class struggle. The author put most emphasis on white underclass, so called "white trash", while white elites, black underclass are also touched upon. Events, public figures, and cultu...
评分A chronical retell of the history of america from the perspective of the class struggle. The author put most emphasis on white underclass, so called "white trash", while white elites, black underclass are also touched upon. Events, public figures, and cultu...
评分A chronical retell of the history of america from the perspective of the class struggle. The author put most emphasis on white underclass, so called "white trash", while white elites, black underclass are also touched upon. Events, public figures, and cultu...
评分A chronical retell of the history of america from the perspective of the class struggle. The author put most emphasis on white underclass, so called "white trash", while white elites, black underclass are also touched upon. Events, public figures, and cultu...
用户评价
这本书的文字密度和情感张力，简直让人喘不过气。它不像传统的纪实文学那样追求客观和平衡，反而带着一种近乎原始的、未经打磨的情感冲击力。阅读过程中，我感觉自己像是在一场持续的、低沉的轰鸣声中穿行，那些破碎的家庭关系、难以言喻的羞耻感，以及那些在绝望中偶尔闪现的、微弱却坚韧的生命力，都被作者用一种近乎诗意的、却又冷硬的笔触捕捉了下来。我尤其欣赏作者在处理复杂人性时的那种不回避、不粉饰的态度。书中的角色并非脸谱化的受害者或恶人，他们是活生生的、充满矛盾的个体。你会看到他们做出了令人发指的举动，但紧接着，作者又会揭示导致这些举动的深层原因，那种心理上的拉扯和纠缠，让读者在谴责的同时，又感到一种深刻的同情与理解。这本书的结构设计也十分巧妙，它不是线性的时间叙事，而是像一幅拼贴画，将不同时间点、不同人物的故事碎片巧妙地嵌入其中，最终拼凑出一个令人心碎却又无比真实的社会图景。它带来的阅读体验是沉浸式的、消耗性的，但绝对是值得的，因为它极大地拓宽了我们对“人”的理解边界。
评分这本书的书名真是直白得让人心头一紧，读完之后，我发现它远不止一个挑衅性的标签那么简单。作者似乎拥有某种近乎残酷的洞察力，将镜头聚焦于那些被社会主流叙事排斥在外的人生切片。我尤其被其中关于“机遇不均等”的描绘所震撼。书中描绘的那些小镇生活，那种代际传递的贫困和宿命感，不是那种廉价的煽情，而是如同冰冷的解剖刀，精准地切开了系统性的困境。你读到那些为了微薄的尊严而挣扎的个体，他们或许做出了旁人看来愚蠢的选择，但在当时的语境下，那似乎是唯一的出路。它探讨了环境如何塑造一个人的道德罗盘和人生轨迹，让我不得不反思，我们对“成功”和“失败”的定义，是否过于简化和傲慢。这本书的叙事节奏把握得极妙，它不是那种平铺直叙的报告文学，而是穿插着极富画面感的场景描写和人物内心独白，让读者仿佛身临其境地体验着那种被生活反复挤压的窒息感。我合上书页时，心中久久不能平静，它迫使我审视自己所处的舒适区，并对那些我们轻易做出的价值判断，产生了深刻的怀疑。它成功地将一个看似边缘的主题，提升到了关于社会结构和人性韧性的哲学讨论层面。
评分初翻开这本作品时，我带着一种审慎的好奇心，毕竟书名本身就带有强烈的标签化倾向。然而，阅读体验很快就证明了我的初始判断是片面的。这本书的真正力量，在于它如何不动声色地拆解那些约定俗成的社会阶层壁垒。作者似乎拥有一种罕见的同理心，能够深入到那些日常生活中被忽略的角落，捕捉那些细微的、只有身处其中的人才懂的生存法则和交流密码。我特别留意到书中对于地域文化和方言俚语的运用，这些细节的处理，为整个故事增添了无可替代的真实感和厚重感，让那些远在千里之外的读者，也能真切地感受到那种特定环境下的氛围。这本书不是在简单地控诉，它更多的是在进行一种深层次的社会学观察，探讨的是文化资本和经济资本如何在代际间形成难以逾越的鸿沟。它让我开始重新审视“向上流动”这个概念，在某些环境下，它或许更像是一种神话，而非普遍的现实。读完后，我开始在日常生活中，对那些看似寻常的互动多了一层思考：我们究竟是在与人交流，还是在与人固有的社会身份交流？这本书无疑是强有力的思想催化剂。
评分这本书的叙事风格简直像一场高速行驶的列车，充满了不可预测的颠簸和突然的加速。它有一种令人上瘾的、近乎野蛮的生命力，那种从底层挣扎出来的呐喊，透过纸面都能清晰地传达出来。我最欣赏的是，作者并没有采用高高在上的俯视视角来评判这些人物的生活，而是以一种平视甚至略微倾斜的角度，与他们并肩站立，共同面对那些令人绝望的困境。书中对于物质匮乏的描写，达到了令人咋舌的细致程度，你仿佛能闻到那些旧屋子里的霉味，能感受到那些因营养不良带来的持续疲惫。这种对感官细节的极致捕捉，使得这本书超越了一般的社会评论，更像是一部扎根于土地的、疼痛的史诗。它探讨了在资源极度受限的环境下，个人意志力能支撑多久，以及“希望”这个词，在现实的重压下会如何被重新定义。与其说这是一本读物，不如说它是一次强烈的、情感上的“在场体验”，它迫使你直面人性的脆弱与坚韧，其冲击力持续时间之长，是我近期阅读中少有的。
评分这部作品的文学性在于其对“疏离感”的精妙处理。它描绘了一个群体，但重点却在于这个群体与主流社会之间那道看不见的、却又坚不可摧的隔阂。作者的语言风格非常克制，却又在关键时刻爆发出惊人的力量，像是在平静的湖面下隐藏着汹涌的暗流。我发现书中有很多关于“身份认同”的探讨，这些人物对于自己是谁，以及他们被社会如何定义，有着非常复杂且痛苦的认知。他们既想挣脱现有的标签，又在某种程度上被这些标签所塑造和定义。这本书成功地避开了将“贫穷”浪漫化或妖魔化的陷阱，它只是冷静地展示了生存的逻辑，那种逻辑往往与我们城市中推崇的价值体系大相径庭。我特别喜欢其中穿插的那些关于家庭秘史的零星片段，这些碎片化的信息如同考古发掘一般，慢慢揭示了为什么这些人的命运会如此纠缠在一起。读完后，你不会得到一个简单的答案或解决方案，但你会获得一种更深层次的理解：社会结构的复杂性远超我们的想象，而那些被忽略的角落，往往蕴藏着最真实的、最复杂的人类故事。
评分很有意思的书，风格偏论文，所以大概没人读
评分很有意思的书，风格偏论文，所以大概没人读
评分Mostly Audiobook
评分特朗普的崛起原因
评分嘿嘿嘿嘿... ????????????????
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