Abstract
This paper explores Alice Childress work Like One of the Family, a collection of short stories originally published as a column the newspaper Freedom, and how Childress uses the highly personable work to advocate for socialist ideology and exhibit how socialism could positively affect the black working class, particularly domestic workers. Through her work, Childress humanizes the domestic worker, a group that was often not only disenfranchised by whites but also prohibited from labor organizing with other African-Americans. She engages with Marx’s ideology in an understandable and personal way: by utilizing the African-American oral tradition. This exposed her audience to a largely unfamiliar ideology in a way that would connect with them.
Recommended Citation
Elliott, Elizabeth.
"Marxist Ideology in Alice Chilress’s Like One of the Family."
The Downtown Review.
Vol. 5.
Iss.
2
(2019)
.
Available at:
https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/tdr/vol5/iss2/1
Included in
African Languages and Societies Commons, American Studies Commons, Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons, Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies Commons
