Social Class In America Essay

Class is a very powerful system in America’s society that divides people into categories based on social and/or economic statuses. Within classes, there are a set of boundaries and characteristics, that identify individuals accordingly. There are three major known classes existing in America today that are the upper, middle, and working class. As suggested by the names, the list goes from wealthiest to poorest classifications. Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself” and Emily Dickinson 's poem “Some keep the Sabbath going to Church,” are two examples of how class affects individual’s lifestyles and personality. Both works offer perspectives on how themes of class are manifested in American life through social norms such as (in)equality and unity. In each social class status there are characteristics that can be easily identified from group to group such as low or high income, well-taken care of neighborhoods, and possessions (e.g. people, things, degrees, legacies, etc.) that contribute to the norms of the particular class status an individual is in. For example, in section 17 of Walt Whitman’s “Song of …show more content…
Class is differentiated from status in that the latter suggests a range and continuum, while class connotes a degree of unity and some form of homogeneity among its” (491). Goldschmidt talks about the ways in which the definition of class in America leaves out which community the definition is referencing to, what homogeneity consists of, the basis in which classes are established, and the value of hierarchical order (491). There is room for interpretation which is in some way, the reason why Dickinson and Whitman feel differently about America’s class