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Calling Home: Working-Class Women's Writings
Working-class women are the majority of women in the United States, and yet their work and their culture are rarely visible. Calling Home is an anthology of writings by and about working-class women. Over fifty selections represent the ethnic, racial, and geographic diversity of working-class experience. This is writing grounded in social history, not in the academy. Traditional boundaries of genre and periodization collapse in this collection, which includes reportage, oral histories, speeches, songs, and letters, as well as poetry, stories, and essays. The divisions in this collection - telling stories, bearing witness, celebrating solidarity - address the distinction of "by" or "about" working-class women, and show the connections between individual identity and collective sensibility in a common history of struggle for economic justice.
The geography of home, identity, parents, sex, motherhood, the dominance of the job, the overlapping of private and public worlds, the promise of solidarity and community are a few of the themes of this book. Here is a chorus of working class women's voices: Sandra Cisneros, Barbara Garson, Meridel Le Sueur, Tillie Olsen, Barbara Smith, Endesha I. M. Holland, Mother Jones, Nellie Wong, Agnes Smedley, Bobbie Louise Hawkins, Sharon Doubiago, Carol Tarlen, Hazel Hall, Margaret Randall, Judy Grahn, and many others!
The aesthetic impulse is shaped by class, but not limited to one ruling class. What connects these writers is a collective consciousness, a class, which rejects bondage and lays claim to liberation through all the possibilities of language. Calling Home is illustrated with family photographs as well as images of working women by professional photographers.
The geography of home, identity, parents, sex, motherhood, the dominance of the job, the overlapping of private and public worlds, the promise of solidarity and community are a few of the themes of this book. Here is a chorus of working class women's voices: Sandra Cisneros, Barbara Garson, Meridel Le Sueur, Tillie Olsen, Barbara Smith, Endesha I. M. Holland, Mother Jones, Nellie Wong, Agnes Smedley, Bobbie Louise Hawkins, Sharon Doubiago, Carol Tarlen, Hazel Hall, Margaret Randall, Judy Grahn, and many others!
The aesthetic impulse is shaped by class, but not limited to one ruling class. What connects these writers is a collective consciousness, a class, which rejects bondage and lays claim to liberation through all the possibilities of language. Calling Home is illustrated with family photographs as well as images of working women by professional photographers.
- GenresFeminism
384 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 1990
58 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
March 25, 2023
There are times when we could use a short piece of writing, whether an essay, short story, poem, what-have-you, something that one can finish in a short period of time before going on to the next short piece. Calling Home: Working-Class Women's Writings, edited by Janet Zandy, is close to as perfect a collection of short writings as can be found.
The introduction shows that this can be used as a classroom text, describing class (working-class, middle class, etc.), writing, the lives of working-class women, as well as working-class literature. Zandy explains that "the life experiences of working-class women are not affirmed or valued in the dominant culture, or considered fitting subjects for literature. This anthology looks at the lives of working-class women at the crossroads of their lived experiences and their imagined ones, those they might call home."
Zandy, a professor at the Rochester (NY) Institute of Technology for many years (now Professor Emerita), grew up in a working-class family, and experienced the feelings of not quite fitting in, once she'd earned her degrees and began teaching; editing a book of working-class writing is a good fit.
The book itself has writings in three major sections: Part One: Telling Stories; Part Two: Bearing Witness; and Part Three: Celebrating Solidarity. Each section has several subsections, with several essays, short stories, and poems dealing with working-class women.
The writers themselves are as varied as their writings: we're offered pieces by Sandra Cisneros, Dorthy Allison, Mother (Mary) Jones, Tillie Olsen, Agnes Smedley, Marge Piercy, and many more.
As far as anthologies go for under-valued writers, Janet Zandy 's Calling Home: Working-Class Women's Writings is well worth the read.
The introduction shows that this can be used as a classroom text, describing class (working-class, middle class, etc.), writing, the lives of working-class women, as well as working-class literature. Zandy explains that "the life experiences of working-class women are not affirmed or valued in the dominant culture, or considered fitting subjects for literature. This anthology looks at the lives of working-class women at the crossroads of their lived experiences and their imagined ones, those they might call home."
Zandy, a professor at the Rochester (NY) Institute of Technology for many years (now Professor Emerita), grew up in a working-class family, and experienced the feelings of not quite fitting in, once she'd earned her degrees and began teaching; editing a book of working-class writing is a good fit.
The book itself has writings in three major sections: Part One: Telling Stories; Part Two: Bearing Witness; and Part Three: Celebrating Solidarity. Each section has several subsections, with several essays, short stories, and poems dealing with working-class women.
The writers themselves are as varied as their writings: we're offered pieces by Sandra Cisneros, Dorthy Allison, Mother (Mary) Jones, Tillie Olsen, Agnes Smedley, Marge Piercy, and many more.
As far as anthologies go for under-valued writers, Janet Zandy 's Calling Home: Working-Class Women's Writings is well worth the read.
July 25, 2008
What an interesting collection of life tales by working class women. Tales ranging from their childhoods, to becoming mothers, to widowhood at various ages, and stages....you sorrow along with those who lost and feel brave along with those who had to find courage.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews