Silvina Merenson - Böcker

This book explores the dynamics of the "middle-class global rebellion" born of the frustration at declining living standards. Addressing narratives constructed by different social and political agents and groups, it examines contexts of social crisis in Latin America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Oceania, understanding the middle classes as a set of complex and conflicting political relationships. With attention to the manner in which people create "situated habits", consolidating new expectations and desires through a concrete biography, it analyzes continuities and changes in classed self-perceptions based on performative use. With new perspectives, including historical and intersectional approaches, Middle Class Identities and Social Crisis transcends disciplinary boundaries to explore the hybridity of research methods and techniques and challenge established analytical frameworks. It will therefore appeal to scholars across the social sciences with interests in class and questions of class identity.

This book explores the dynamics of the "middle-class global rebellion" born of the frustration at declining living standards. Addressing narratives constructed by different social and political agents and groups, it examines contexts of social crisis in Latin America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Oceania, understanding the middle classes as a set of complex and conflicting political relationships. With attention to the manner in which people create "situated habits", consolidating new expectations and desires through a concrete biography, it analyzes continuities and changes in classed self-perceptions based on performative use. With new perspectives, including historical and intersectional approaches, Middle Class Identities and Social Crisis transcends disciplinary boundaries to explore the hybridity of research methods and techniques and challenge established analytical frameworks. It will therefore appeal to scholars across the social sciences with interests in class and questions of class identity.

In Indians, Blacks, and Morochos Menara Guizardi and Silvina Merenson address the relationships between stratification and social mobility in contemporary Argentina, using an ethnographic study on class relations in the San Telmo neighborhood of Buenos Aires. Relying on the Extended Case Method, the authors narrate the life history of Ramiro. A worker who has lived in the neighborhood for forty years, Ramiro strives to carve out a career through a network of micro and macro social relationships and conflicts that frame his daily life. Synthesizing the debates on class internationally and in Argentina, Guizardi and Merenson establish the study's initial theoretical frameworks and describe the methodology used. They then reconstruct Ramiro's life starting from his experiences in his home province of Tucuman, his migration to Buenos Aires, his settling in San Telmo and entering the work force, and the class conflicts that he experienced. The authors conclude by presenting a tentative anthropological conceptualization of class.