Oh Ohhh He's a working class man

working class writers have long been ignored in celebrations and examinations of poetry over time. Significantly absent in all literary canons, working class writers have been producing poetry that is considered beyond the pale. Working class writers face obstacles such as education, long working hours, lack of support to produce or publish their work. "Their work adresses themes which include work, unemployment, poverty, violence, community and family. These themes have been seen as jarring a middle-class sensibility, which is prone to rejecting such realistic accounts of working life as inappropriate concerns of poetry.(Attfield,2007)

As there is limited spaces where working class literature can be published, met with acceptance and appreciation, we have decided to create such a space. This blog is a collection of various working class literature and art forms, in order to give a voice to "the cultural traditions of working life and to explore how these traditions shape the forms and characteristics of literary expressions. (Lauter, 2005)



Attfield, S. ,2009, ‘The Poetics of Class’ from Working class Voices: The Working Class Experience in Contemporary Australian Poetry, VDM: Saarbruken, 40-62


Lauter, P, 2005, ‘UnderConstruction: Working Class Writing’ in Sherry Linkon and John Russo (eds) New Working Class Studies, Ithica: Cornell University Press, 63-77

Thursday, 8 September 2011

Still mad at uncle sam


Working class writing is often subject to criticism that labels it merely as propaganda or as politically motivated. Zandy (2004) states that working class poetry is ultimately concerned with the ' means of struggle'. However Lauter (2005) disagrees,stating "the working class has been composing in every available genre, in a great variety of styles, and with many different objectives for as long as poetry has existed."(Lauter 2005, p.64)    
Perhaps the reason there is such a prevalence of "marxist sentiment" that characterizes much of the work is because as Sarah Attfield finds:
"It is not possible to separate art and aesthetics from politics and society, and even those works of literature that claim to have transcended ideological considerations can be seen as having political implications as the writer is revealing the kind of class privilege that allows a distancing from the everyday. Literature is not, as Bernstein asserts, created in a vacuum completely separate from society and therefore, ideology can not help but shape literature"  Charles Bernstein, A Poetics, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992).
Thus, all texts reflect the context in which they are written. Working class poetry comes from a particular angle just as middle class poetry expresses ideologies that are relevant to them. 
For example Working class poetry may not have use for the metaphorical musings of nature and love characteristic of romanticism, but instead often concentrates on the gritty realism of day to day working life. 
maybe the problem is that criticism places romantic poetry at the pinnacle of acceptable poetry styles, revealing the elitist attitude within literary theory and constructed canons.


 Bernstein,C. 1992, A Poetics, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press).

Lauter, P, 2005, ‘UnderConstruction: Working Class Writing’ in Sherry Linkon and John Russo (eds) New Working Class Studies, Ithica: Cornell University Press, 63-77

Zandy,J. 1995 ‘‘Editorial: Working-Class Studies,’’ Women’’s Studies Quarterly 1-2 (5).
 


 
Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)