>You live surrounded by people who have little in common with Wolfe's
>sample. So do I, for rather different reasons. Why ignore our neighbors,
>other than to promote mystification?
>
>Doug
i can't believe i actually have to post this: the title of his book is, in full: One nation, after all: HOW THE MIDDLE CLASS REALLY THINKS ABOUT GOD, COUNTRY AND FAMILY (caps b/c it was a cut and paste.) for awhile there i thought i was in the midst of some kind of bizarro surreal movie because no one had noticed this little factoid.
does he say --in his title-- that he is worried about the manual workers and the poor?
as i've said a couple of times now: Wolfe makes really clear that he is replicating the research done by Bellah et al. He set out to criticize their work, among other things. He interviewed the same kinds of people they did, for the same reasons that they did. and once again, Wolfe is NOT trying to say that they speak for all Americans. this is plainly evident by the sub title.
he is saying that we can understand something about US culture by looking at that class that does much to shape the contours of that culture. he is studying culture and doing the sociology of morality -- culture is about norms and it's about normative prescriptions and proscriptions about how we "ought" to behave. if you want to find out about these oughts and shoulds where would you look? on the margins of society or in the mainstream? there is an argument for looking at the margins, but he chose a different tack for a very specific reason--to engage in a conversation with Bellah et al.
bellah and, consequently, wolfe go to where people think they are middle class and upper middle class. and, not only that, they go to where people who not only think they are middle and upper middle class are, but are in positions to actually tell other people what it means to be middle and upper middle class. the kinds of people who teach in public schools, who work in social service agencies, real estate agents, who practice therapy, who are managers, who do all sorts of things day in and day out and by virtue of doing so define in their every day social practices what it means to belong to this so-called middle class. these people are positions to tell other people how they ought to think about issues. just as the people who run low income loan programs that i study tell participants what the american dream is about: they are telling them what it means to be "an american", what it means to be "middle class" -- even tho these people are not and won't likely be "middle class" and may never even think of themselves as middle class. these bankers, real estate agents, social workers, teachers, loan officers, they tell them things like: "any body can save $10/wk. i don't care if you earn $10 a week. you can save it".
again, i can't assess chris's claims about celebrating this culture. but i am absolutely certain about what wolfe intends by focusing on these four cities and doing so in suburbia among middle and mostly upper middle class USers. it is mainly because he is engaging in a critique and conversation with Bellah et. al. he also spells it out his, for you, undue obsession with the middle class by maintaining that his book is about the middle class.