Part two of Barbara Ehrenreich's novel Nickel and Dimed titled Scrubbing Maine illustrates how those who have jobs that require janitorial work, work excessivley, yet they are looked down upon and are seen as outcast.Barbara chose the reside in Maine because it is mainly populated by Caucasians , so finding a low wage work force would be accessible. In this section of the novel Barbara takes a job as a maid and a dietary aide for Woodcrest Residential Facility(not the real name). She works at Woodcrest on the weekends and is responsible for serving the elderly their meals and doing janitorial work such as vacuuming and washing the dishes. Her second job consists of being a maid. It requires a lot of physical work and is extremely tiring but its necessary that she works both jobs to make ends meet. She soon comes to realize that maids for the most part are ignored. For example,one day while at a dinner she tried to order an iced tea but the waitress continued with her conversation and simply ignoired her as if she was superior to a maid. Barbara endured more that just stares and being ignored though, at one point she was forced to call for some source of help mainly for food. It took about a hour of calling but she recieved the food that was neccessary. While staying in Maine Brabara began to feel defeated and became frustrated. She even found herself sticking up for a coworker to their boss. Surprisingly, it earned her a raise and a praise of approval from their boss. As the end of the month approached Barbara revealed her true identity to her fellow coworkers and questioned "How do they feel, not about Ted(their boss) but about the owners whohave so much whle others, like themselves barely get buy?" One woman looked at it as motivation, while the other felt that she did not need all that they had.
Discusson Questions
In Scrubbing Maine Barbara states that maides are ignored and are outcast.Do you agree with her? Do you see yourself looking down on those who do the jobs that most of us could not imagine dong such as janitorial work?
In one secton of the chapter Holly says"If we're cleaning their house they're wealthy." Do you agree with this? Is everyne who has someone clean ther house wealthy? Is this saying that many wealthy people are too lazy to clean their own homes?
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okay to answer your first question i dont see myself looking down at any other person who do the jobs that many of us cant do. I've heard this many times before and instead of being disgusted or like feel superior we should feel so asinine for not being able to do what someone else does for such a little bit of money. I dont look down on anyone and specially not at a worker who does her/his job when i dont work my self.
ReplyDeleteNo, i dont believe that anyone who has someone else clean their house is wealthy. However there are some people who are wealthy and have maids and some other wealthy families do not have maids so i dont really believe that someone who has someone else clean there house is actually wealthy. I dont think that wealthy people are lazy either im not wealthy and im lazy myself.
ReplyDeleteI don't believe that most of the people who have maids are wealthy. However, the majority of them are. I do feel that most of them hire maids because they are too lazy to clean for themselves. In other cases, it is simply because their jobs do not allow them enough free time to clean houses as big as theirs may be.
ReplyDeleteI do believe people that are wealthy have maids. People that do not have money can't afford someone to clean up after them. Wealthy people are sometimes lazy but other times they are too busy making money to clean up after themsleves. Sometimes the wealthy are lazy and do not want to clean up after themselves because they never had to since they are wealthy.
ReplyDeleteI do believe that maids are ignored because they aren't there to be noticed but to do the work that you've left for them to do. I do not look down on the maids but I do appreciate them doing work that I can do on my own because I was brought up doing work that they do.
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