April 19, 2017
Blog Response: "From Weapons of the Weak" and "From Race Rebels"
Scott and Kelley
both talk about everyday forms of resistance in the contexts of peasants in
Malaysia and black and Chicano youth in Los Angeles, respectively. I found it
interesting to compare these two articles because the forms of resistance and
the reasoning behind them were entirely different. Peasants in Malaysia
resisted by doing the minimum and faking illness with intention to weaken the
authority, often leading to political revolutions. They were unhappy and wanted
change. In contrast, the teenagers in the McDonald's in Los Angeles rebelled by
cooking too much food or altering and accessorizing their uniforms. Their
resistance was more of an unconscious response to the institutional issues of
race and income. The young workers didn't seem to care that they were getting
criticized by their customers or received low wages and hours. They tried to
make the best out of what they had. Their intention wasn't to bring down the
authority, but to do things their own way. The difference in Scott and Kelley's
examples shows that resistance is caused by different reasons, comes in many
forms, and changes depending on the time period.
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