Like gender and race, class can be conceptualized as an articulation of power and cultural difference, which is historicized as materially and symbolically inscribed sets of impositions, practices, and personal and collective meanings; simultaneously constitutive of and constituted by social relations and institutional arrangements; and subject to contestation, definition, and redefinition.--"Social Class." Encyclopedia of American Studies
Alias Grace by Margaret AtwoodCall Number: At96a
A fictionalized account of Grace Marks, a maid who murdered her employer and his mistress in Canada in 1843.
An Appetite for Violets by Martine BaileyCall Number: Ba153a
Biddy becomes embroiled in a murderous conspiracy, knowing the secrets she holds could be a key to a better life, or her downfall. Inspired by eighteenth-century household books of recipes and set at the time of the invention of the first restaurants, An Appetite for Violets opens a window into the lives of servants, while also delivering a suspenseful tale of obsession and betrayal
Bastard Out of Carolina by Dorothy AllisonCall Number: AL563b
Greenville County, South Carolina, is a wild, lush place that is home to the Boatwright family—a clan of hard-drinking men who shoot up each other’s trucks, and indomitable women who get married young. Ruth Anne Boatwright, a bastard child who suffers sexual abuse at the hands of her step-father, observes the world around her with a mercilessly keen perspective.
Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo MbueCall Number: Mb459be
In the fall of 2007, Jende Jonga, a Cameroonian immigrant, lands a job as a chauffeur for a senior executive at Lehman Brothers. Their situation only improves when Jende's wife Neni is hired as household help. But in the course of their work, Jende and Neni begin to witness family secrets. Then, with the 2008 collapse of Lehman Brothers, a tragedy changes all four lives forever.
Drown by Junot DíazCall Number: Di5432d
Stories set in the Dominican Republic and in New Jersey. In Ysrael, a boy is disfigured by a pig, No Face is on his trip to America to undergo plastic surgery, and How to Date is on the art of dating interracially.
Germinal by Émile ZolaCall Number: Zo74ge
When conditions in a mining community deteriorate, Lantier finds himself leading a strike that could mean starvation or salvation for all.
Hard Twisted by C. Joseph GreavesCall Number: Gr7989h
In May of 1934, Oklahoma, a homeless man and his thirteen-year-old daughter are befriended by a charismatic drifter. The drifter lures father and daughter to Texas, where the father mysteriously disappears, and where his daughter begins a one-year ordeal as Palmer's captive on a crime spree-culminating in the notorious Greenville, Texas "skeleton murder" trial of 1935.
House of Earth by Woody GuthrieCall Number: Gu9849h
Tike and Ella May Hamlin are struggling to plant roots in the arid land of the Texas panhandle. Thanks to a five-cent government pamphlet, Tike has the know-how to build a simple adobe dwelling, a structure made from the land itself—fireproof, windproof, Dust Bowl-proof.
The House on Mango Street by Sandra CisnerosCall Number: Ci497h
Told in a series of vignettes – sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes deeply joyous – it is the story of a young Latina girl growing up in Chicago, inventing for herself who and what she will become.
How Beautiful We Were by Imbolo MbueCall Number: Mb459h
Publication Date: 2021
A fearless young woman from a small African village starts a revolution against an American oil company in this sweeping, inspiring novel.
I Hotel by Karen Tei Yamashita; Leland Wong (Illustrator); Sina Grace (Illustrator)Call Number: Ya147i
Beginning in 1968, a motley cast of students, laborers, artists, revolutionaries, and provocateurs from San Francisco's Chinatown make their way through the history of the day, becoming caught in a riptide of politics and passion, clashing ideologies and personal turmoil that culminate in their effort to save the International Hotel--epicenter of the Yellow Power Movement.
In the Distance by Hernán DíazCall Number: Di543i
A young Swedish boy finds himself in penniless and alone in California. He travels East in search of his brother, moving on foot against the great push to the West. Driven back over and over again on his journey through vast expanses, Håkan meets naturalists, criminals, religious fanatics, Indians, and lawmen, and his exploits turn him into a legend.
The Jungle by Upton SinclairCall Number: Si62j
The horrifying conditions of the Chicago stockyards at the turn of the century are revealed through this narrative of a young immigrant's struggles in America.
Learning to See by Elise HooperCall Number: Ho766L
By the early 1930s, as America's economy collapses, Dorothea must find ways to support her two young sons single-handedly. Determined to expose the horrific conditions of the nation's poor, she takes to the road with her camera, creating images that inspire, reform, and define the era. And when the United States enters World War II, Dorothea chooses to confront the incarceration of thousands of innocent Japanese Americans.
A Master of Djinn by P. Djeli ClarkCall Number: CL548m
Publication Date: 2022
An Arab world never colonized, where magic-powered trams glide through a cosmopolitan Cairo and where djinns make mischief among humans.
A Master of Djinn by P. Djèlí ClarkCall Number: CL548m
Publication Date: 2022
Nebula Award Winner. Al-Jahiz transformed the world forty years ago when he opened up the veil between the magical and mundane realms, before vanishing into the unknown. A murderer claims to be al-Jahiz, returned to condemn the modern age for its social oppressions. His dangerous magical abilities instigate unrest in the streets of Cairo that threaten to spill over onto the global stage.
Middle Passage by Charles R. JohnsonCall Number: Jo6305m
Rutherford Calhoun, a newly freed slave and irrepressible rogue, is lost in the underworld of 1830s New Orleans. Desperate to escape the city’s bill collectors and the pawing hands of a schoolteacher hellbent on marrying him, he jumps aboard the Republic, a slave ship en route to collect members of a legendary African tribe, the Allmuseri.
Native Son by Richard WrightCall Number: Wr935n
Set in Chicago in the 1930s, the story of a young black man caught in a downward spiral after he kills a young white woman in a moment of panic.
The Octopus by Frank NorrisCall Number: No793o
Based on an actual, bloody dispute between wheat farmers and the Southern Pacific Railroad in 1880.
Pachinko by Min Jin LeeCall Number: Le5145p
Follows one Korean family, beginning in early 1900s Korea with Sunja, the prized daughter of a poor family, whose unplanned pregnancy threatens to shame them all. Deserted by her lover, Sunja is saved when a young tubercular minister offers to marry and bring her to Japan. So begins a saga of a family in exile from its homeland and caught in the indifferent arc of history.
People of the Whale by Linda HoganCall Number: Ho678p
When a Native American soldier returns home from Vietnam, he finds his remote seaside tribe in conflict over the decision to hunt a whale, both a symbol of spirituality and rebirth and a means of survival.
Sour Heart by Jenny ZhangCall Number: Zh61s
Centered on a community of immigrants who have traded their endangered lives as artists in China and Taiwan for the constant struggle of life at the poverty line in 1990s New York City.
A State of Freedom by Neel MukherjeeCall Number: Mu8967s
Five characters, in very different circumstances--from a domestic cook in Mumbai, to a vagrant and his dancing bear, to a girl who escapes terror in her home village for a new life in the city--find out the meanings of dislocation and the desire for more.
A Strangeness in My Mind by Orhan Pamuk; Ekin Oklap (Translator)Call Number: Pa191s
Since his boyhood in a poor village in Central Anatolia, Mevlut Karataş has fantasized about what his life would become. He follows his father's trade on the streets of Istanbul, and hopes to become rich like other villagers who have settled the desolate hills outside the booming metropolis. But luck never seems to be on Mevlut's side.
The Twelve Tribes of Hattie by Ayana MathisCall Number: Ma426t
In 1923, fifteen-year-old Hattie Shepherd, swept up by the tides of the Great Migration, flees Georgia and heads north to raise eleven children with grit and courage.
Vanity Fair by William Makepeace ThackerayCall Number: Th325vk
No one is better equipped in the struggle for wealth and worldly success than the alluring and ruthless Becky Sharp who defies her impoverished background to clamber up the class ladder.
Water for Elephants by Sara GruenCall Number: Gr9225w
When Jacob Jankowski, recently orphaned and suddenly adrift, jumps onto a passing train, he enters a world of freaks, grifters, and misfits, a second-rate circus struggling to survive during the Great Depression.
An Albany Trio by 
Alias Grace by 
An Appetite for Violets by 
Bastard Out of Carolina by 
Behold the Dreamers by 
Dark Blue Suit and Other Stories by 
The Disinherited by 
Drown by 
For Dignity, Justice and Revolution: an anthology of Japanese proletarian literature by 
Germinal by 
The Grapes of Wrath by 
Hard Twisted by 
House of Earth by 
The House on Mango Street by 
How Beautiful We Were by 
I Hotel by 
In the Distance by 
The Jungle by 
Learning to See by 
A Manual for Cleaning Women by 
A Master of Djinn by 
Middle Passage by 
Native Son by 
The Octopus by 
Pachinko by 
People of the Whale by 
Sour Heart by 
A State of Freedom by 
A Strangeness in My Mind by 
The Twelve Tribes of Hattie by 
Vanity Fair by 
Water for Elephants by 
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