Being Unequal

How Identity Helps Make and Break Power and Privilege

By (author) Peter L. Callero

Paperback - £25.00

Publication date:

25 July 2017

Length of book:

198 pages

Publisher

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

ISBN-13: 9781538100561

We may think we control our own destinies, but who we are, how we think, what we feel, and how we act are shaped by multiple, intersecting identities that have different amounts of power and value in our society. Being Unequal explores how identity categories associated with race, class, gender, and sexuality help shape inequality. This concise and accessible book asks: How is identity experienced? How does identity help reproduce inequality? How does identity help resist inequality? What is the relationship between micro and macro inequality—in other words, how do our personal experiences shape larger social forces?

Being Unequal argues that identities matter because they are a critical part of a complex social process in which everyday interactions contribute to larger systems of structural inequality. By recognizing the links between identity and inequality, Being Unequal also highlights the power of collective action to resist and oppose domination and exploitation. Filled with engaging real-world examples ranging from the social construction of momentary high school cliques to the emergence of momentous social movements, Being Unequal is a powerful introduction to social identities and the ways they shape our world.
Awareness of the profound structural inequalities that haunt the United States and the globe could not be more critical. But structures are abstract, and it can be all too easy for people, both in advantaged and even in marginalized positions, to be blind to the inequalities that social structures create and maintain. In this volume, Peter Callero brings these inequalities to life by telling the stories of individual people, showing how inequalities are organized through and experienced in human identities. As Callero clearly demonstrates, identities play a critical role in both making and breaking societal inequalities. By showing the power of resistance, Callero leaves his readers with hope for a more just world.