Social Disparity In Bone And Reardan

In both novels, there exists social, economic, and racial disparity. Bone and Junior’s families belonged to the working poor. The working poor is a social class that is currently employed, but does not make enough money to life themselves out of poverty. Junior’s family belongs to the working poor because they work on a reservation that has little money to give to its workers. Bone’s family belongs to the working poor as well because her mother and stepfather have unstable jobs, and they have to keep moving from house to house because they cannot afford to pay the bills. When compared to the people that Bone and Junior associate with, economic disparity seems to taking place. Junior’s peers at Reardan are wealthier, have better clothes, and have …show more content…
The disparity that Bone faced was not only based upon her family’s economic status, there was also racial disparity like in Junior’s situation. Bone was not of a different race than the dominant culture, but she may as well have been. Bone dealt with the social stigmas “bastard” and “white trash,” which allowed for the dominant group in society to organize her into a whole separate class/race of people who were literally considered trash and not white. Living with these social stigmas, Bone faced much discrimination in her life that always served to reinforce the belief that she was of lower worth compared to everyone else around her. When the manager a candy store that Bone stole from when she was a child patronized, and literally looked down at her, and Glen’s family ostracized her and her family during their visits, the idea of her not being worth anything was reinforced. Eventually, Bone’s shame grew to such a point that she began to believe that she was, indeed, trash. Just like Junior, Bone began to see why they and their family were considered trash by society, and started to resent that stigma. However, Junior and Bone adopted different behaviors to cope with their feelings concerning the