>As I understand, Ehrenreich merely describes what her life in a low wage
>position was without making any explict claim as to "what's wrong with
>this picture" or what the "proper" situation should be.
I would be disappointed if she did. She's pretty clear about what she thinks is wrong and what the proper sit should be.
In fact, she confides that she could NOT resist trying to stir up some unionizing sentiments at Walmart. In fact, it is in her description of Walmart life that she becomes most indignant about the situation. Why, why, why aren't we getting pissed off here? Why are these perfectly decent, intelligent people, people who know they are getting shafted, not organizing? Why do they settle? Why do they not look for more work, at a place that pays better. (She has reasonable answers that we can understand: lack of shared information about pay at competing places, etc.)
Even if she hadn't confided her very anti-Walmart sentiments, Ehrenreich always writes in the most lusciously snide ways that make it clear where she stands.
For instance, this gem: While discussing her decision to check out Maine, she notes that, "I downloaded the help-wanted ads from the Portland Herald's Web site, and my desktop wheezed from the strain. At least three of the thousand or so ads I scanned promised "fun, casual" workplace environments, and I pictured flannel-shirted teams bantering on their afternoon cider-and-doughnut breaks. Maybe, I reasoned, when you give white people a whole state to themselves, they treat one another real nice."
I mean, this is what sometimes makes it really hard for people to deal with her. They know that the assumptions that they have about the world are the object of a snide swipe, but it is subtle and funny and that much more frustrating for some of these folks.
What I'm shocked about, though I shouldn't be, is that they responded the way they did. IME, most students would take Ehrenreich's stuff and interpret it through their own lens: there's lots of ways one could take what she's written as an indictment of employees. She doesn't, but she is fair, actually, trying pretty hard to address the standard issues that people are blamed for their plight. And, precisely because she does so, this leaves an ideological crevace where most students, IME, grab so they can secure their favored view of their world, trying to make it safe from Ehrenreich's description _and_ explanation of what is wrong with that picture.
Kelley