Summary Of Weis Class Reunion

In Weis’ Class Reunion (2004), she builds upon her previous ethnographic study that focused on how white working class students were able to navigate through the deindustrialization of the 1980’s and how it related to their own educational experiences. Weis' Class Reunion is “an exploration, empirically and longitudinally, of the remaking of the American white working class in the latter quarter of the twentieth century.” (p. 2) Weis uses pertinent qualitative data gathered using the observations and personal interviews of subjects 15 years apart to show a distinct trend of how the overlapping factors of social class, gender, and race converge to either reinvent the new norm of the white working class or lead to increased social class separation that resulted for those who lacked the ability to overcome the antiquated beliefs of their social class. When one initially processes Weis’ theory that the factors of social class, gender, and race work together to guide the fundamental belief system and ultimate
However, in her review of several studies on Theorizing Class Through Ethnology, Lee notes that “Weis skillfully demonstrates that social class in the 21st century can be understood only in relation to both race and gender.” (2007) In broadening her research to include the other factors that influence what defines the white working class, Weis brings to the forefront that the interactions between whites and blacks as well as the constant conflict between genders within the white working class added to bringing the trends to light that race and gender greatly influence the potential outcomes for this