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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 6, 2009)
street roots 8 February 6, 2009 Elsewhere man Sociologist Dalton Conley takes a wide-angle view o f the newly hatched middle class created a whole new demand for more personal nce, it seems like years ago, the services at low cost American work force’s rising — in other words, productivity was supposed to buy us some free time. No less an eminence low-wage work that only worsens than Jon Kenneth Galbraith worried about inequality. what Americans would do as technological Conley is chair of advances brought leisure to the masses. New York Today, we understand that the digital age University’s means the collapse of old boundaries sociology between work and play as we enter a life department, in which we’re intimately reachable ‘round Adjunct Professor the clock. We used to brag about being of Community plugged in; these days, we can’t get Medicine at the unplugged. Mount Sinai School Sociologist Dalton Conley describes the of Medicine, and social and psychological consequences of research fellow with the National Bureau th is and other aspects of the “weightless” BY A D A M H Y L A STREET N E W S SERVICE O n i g r n n n m i r P ^ f tM r r h . W ith h is b o o k s : " T h e r e 's a lw a y s t h is s p e c t e r t h a t w e ' r e d is p o s a b l e , t h a t A.H.: You describe the social anxiety o f the middle classes, who may not know ne worth. Some o f that isn't too PHOTO COURTESY OF DALTON CONLEY W e a lth , a n d S o c ia l P o lic y in A m e r i c a ” a n d U .S .A .: H o w W e i G o t fro m th e Company Man, Family Dinners, and the Affluent in the marketplace. Society to the Because what we have to Home Office, BlackBerry Moms, offer isn't really anything and Economic we can point to lite ra lly /' Anxiety” (Pantheon) as high technology, changing gender roles, and hardening class lines have altered life in the workplace and at home. The dollar value of one’s labor, Dalton argues, has abstracted as the middle class moves from the industrial into the symbolic sector, spurring anxiety about one’s earning power and social standing. There's an old word for this, Conley writes: alienation. Our sense of detachment from the real economy has us working scared and putting in more hours, while the rise of the two-income family has w e're re a lly n o t necessary and in fact are overvalued “The Pecking Order: Which Siblings Succeed and Why” and he has explored the interaction of social class with racial and other physical characteristics. These are subjects that Conley, in his youth, explored empirically: his memoir describes growing up in the mostly black and Latino housing projects of New York's Upper East Side. Adam Hyla: You left your cell phone at home today. How appropriate. How does it feel? Dalton Conley: Like I left my kid in the stroller outside a restaurant, or in the car with the windows up. It's definitely a feeling like something key is missing. AJL: Your book is about anxiety and alienation, and that's sort o f what it's like right now. D.C.: Well, I think that certainly for people who are upwardly mobile, they’ve experienced that fear that the rug's going to be pulled out from under them. That the clock's going to strike midnight and the ball's over. But what I argue is that never before have there been so many people in the professional classes that work so far removed from the actual physical production of any product and/or anything that's really related to material survival. Therefore, there's always this specter that we're disposable, that we're really not necessary and in fact are overvalued in the marketplace. Because what we have to offer isn’t really anyth in g we can point to literally. AJL: It seems like a lot o f these jobs are never boring. Is that a blessing or a curse? D.C.: Exactly. See ELSEWHERE, page 9 Purchase this or any other book through the Powell's Book Store link at www.streetroots.org, and Powell's will donate a portion of the sale price to Street Roots. ,\¿\CiO xSö * Meeting 4tom& Groton you where s h o p fr e s h s h o p lo c a l you're at. Multnomah County Health Department syringe exchange & disposal • condoms & supplies • referrals • health info • someone to talk to EA S Y & F U N TO S H O P • LO C A LLY O W N E D & O P E R A T E D w w w .n e w s e a s o n s m a r k e t.c o m Call fo r times and locations. 503-280-1611 English • 503-988-6333 Español
