books about class and organizing

[Discussion list for COMM-ORG]

[ed: thanks to Catherine and Windy for continuing the discussion.]

From: "Catherine Mobley" <CAMOBLE at exchange.clemson.edu>

I'd like to echo the sentiments about Linda Stouts book. I have found
it to be very useful for my Policy and Social Change class.
Also, the books on Teaching for (and Readings on) Diversity and Social
Justice (by Maurianne Adams) are quite good, too.

I, too, discovered Ruby Payne several years ago. At first, I was
enamored with her work. But, some colleagues have since introduced me
to another perspective on her books. I only present this information to
show another viewpoint on her perspective. I highly encourage you to
read the essay in Rethinking Schools about her work:

http://www.rethinkingschools.org/archive/22_01/ruby221.shtml

Just another viewpoint...

Catherine


***************************

From: Windy Cooler-Stith <windy_coolerstith at yahoo.com>

Several years ago, small son in tow, I spent all the money I had, 
leaving the Southern US for the first time in my entire life, on my 
first plane trip, to work as a volunteer for a very prominent 
“poor”-by-choice peace activist in Chicago. I was hoping that the 
experience would school me in all things ideologically to the Left that 
I felt I needed to know to succeed as an anti-poverty organizer in 
Alabama - where I was already poor-but-not-by-choice and a successful 
anti-poverty organizer in many ways.

Clearly, I was working class. That unmistakable, irrational, sense of 
know-nothingness and incompetence in the face of middle-class formal 
education and culture says it all.

I did get something of life-long ideological value out of that summer. 
It came from the book: Thinking Class: Sketches from a Cultural Worker 
by Joanna Kadi. This remains my absolute favorite book about class. I 
have given people copies for Christmas. This is the book that taught me 
that I was lower-working class and what that really meant. It taught me 
about racism and homophobia in details and systems I had never fully 
fathomed on my own – or as a result of any myriad of the trainings I 
routinely attended. That book spoke to me like the Horn of Gabriel.

If I could meet Joanna Kadi today I would kiss her feet.

The book is poetic, lyrical, and beautiful at the same time is powerful 
and educational. I highly recommend it.

You can order it from South End Press at: 
http://www.southendpress.org/search?query=Kadi&action=find_book&search_key=all

-Windy

*Take the 2008 Survey of Organizer Well-Being at InspiredPropinquity.com 
today; pass it to a friend who needs it!*



Discussion list for COMM-ORG wrote:
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> [ed:  please feel welcomed to send other books on your favorites lists.]
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> From: SusanGSMcGee at aol.com
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>
> I discovered a book that many of you may already be familiar with 
> "Bridging the Class Divide and Other Lessons for Grassroots Organizing" 
> by Linda Stout, Founder of the Piedmont Peace Project, with a foreword 
> by Howard Zinn, 1996 Beacon Press.
>  
> I find that there are very few books that talk about class in specific 
> terms. (Another that I have discovered is Ruby Payne's Bridges Out of 
> Poverty) There are many books who mention class as an "aside." Linda 
> Stout is a feminist, a lesbian, and an organizer who focuses on class 
> issues in her work building an organization focused on peace. She deals 
> with issues such as: social change versus social services; principles of 
> organizing; the backlash; and redefining leadership so that it is 
> embodied in a group rather than an individual. She gives specific 
> details about how she was discouraged, discredited and discounted as a 
> working class organizer. She has a great intersectional analysis. Check 
> it out.
>  
> Susan
>  
>
>
>
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>
> Susan G. S. McGee*
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> Education for /ACTION!/ (Educ 313/WS 313)
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