The Coalminer’s Granddaughter: Narratives of Pain and Redemption as Drivers of Working-class Politics

• In Event: 3259 - Political Culture and Gender

Abstract

The election of Donald Trump as President of the United States in November 2016 sparked renewed interest in the political culture of the white working class. While numerous analyses have focused on the cultural marginalization and racial resentment of white working-class men, less research has examined the political beliefs and behaviors of white working-class women. This paper uncovers the emotions, narratives, and cultural worldviews that underlie and generate the construction of working-class white women’s political identities. In the post-industrial age, the traditional structures of working-class interactions such as manual labor, unions, marriage, church, and social clubs have diminished. In this void, we find that the personal management of suffering, particularly in intimate life, serves as a driver of working-class political behavior. Drawing on 40 in-depth interviews conducted in the coal region of Pennsylvania from 2015-2017, we explore how white women – whose fortunes still remain tightly linked to white men’s – mourn the loss of their subordinate roles as wives and mothers even as they are victimized by them. We demonstrate how narratives of pain and trauma within the family reverberate into larger visions of a political arena where no one can be trusted and protecting the self requires constant vigilance. Individual pain management is a necessity in a system where family and community ties are fragile, trust is low, and the risks of advanced capitalism have been displaced onto individuals. Individualized strategies for coping with pain and finding personal redemption have themselves become sources of political stimulus and reaction among the working class.

Authors

• Jennifer M. Silva, Bucknell University

• Kaitlyn Smeraldo, Ohio State University