Summary of White Trash: by Nancy Isenberg | Includes Analysis

By Instaread Summaries

Summary of White Trash by Nancy Isenberg | Includes Analysis

 

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White Trash by historian Nancy Isenberg is a riveting chronicle of class in America as explored through the role and the plight of the white underclass from the days of colonial settlers to the pr

• Language: English
• Publisher: Instaread, Inc
• Release date: Feb 23, 2019
• ISBN: 9781683784937

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Overview

White Trash by historian Nancy Isenberg is a riveting chronicle of class in America as explored through the role and the plight of the white underclass from the days of colonial settlers to the present.

Despite the founders’ declaration that all men are created equal, the reality of life in America has continuously told a different story. With careful research, Isenberg reviews the popular American myth of equality for all and illustrates how poor whites, or white trash, have traditionally been a much-derided, marginalized part of American society.

Class hierarchy traces back to America’s earliest history. Contrary to the myth that American colonial settlers were either enterprising businessmen or devout Christians fleeing religious persecution, the majority were actually economically challenged outcasts or social burdens that the English were happy to be rid of. Many were criminals, vagrants, and orphans who then became indentured servants with no landowning rights. Thus, from the nation’s beginnings as a colonial society, there arose a firmly entrenched social order in which landowners, politicians, and other well-bred families occupied a higher station than servants who had no land and therefore no power.

Throughout this 400-year history, the circumstances of poor whites have changed, but the overall disdain and prejudice against this sector of society has not. Despite gains made by Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal and other governmental efforts to aid the poor, many middle- and upper-class Americans are still contemptuous of this population, which is seen as a