Throughout the 1930s there was a lot of adversity. Adversity for small-time farmers just trying to survive, city-folk who were constantly looking for work in a dying economy, and adversity for the government to overcome the many travesties of the Great Depression. There were issues that affected all walks of American and global life, such as the stock market crash in 1929. 1 As a result of the stock market crash, not only were American farmers and industrial workers hit with a catastrophic economic decline, but also most countries in the world. For industrial workers, one of the problems was that factories could not provide adequate wages for their employees so they could not acquire laborers. This led to a deep decline in industrial production and deflation in prices, high unemployment rates, mass panic and a sharp increase in poverty and homelessness. On Voyant, I targeted the term “Homeless” and found that “Subway Stuff” mentioned homelessness on the subway trains at night which is still happening today. 2. Throughout my research on Voyant, I noticed a heavier correlation with the terms “men”, “jobs”, and “work” than the terms “woman”, “job” and “work” within the articles pertaining industrial living but the opposite correlation between them when looking at rural living related articles.
This was interesting because the way of life that this correlation portrays is not only that it was much harder for women to obtain jobs in the 1930s but also today when women face much more adversity and negative stereotyping than men obtaining jobs and in the workplace. It was also interesting because it made me think about if the socio-cultural way of rural living is a more advanced in the way of gender equality. By comparing these terms on Voyant and reading the articles, I was able to draw conclusions to the fact that rural living is more advanced in gender norms and equality in not only everyday life, but also in working environments.
Coming from a background of rural living and farm life myself and noticing this opposite correlation among rural living, I looked more deeply at these articles to find information. In the article “A Farming Preacher”, 3 the man interviewed mentioned working together and providing on the farm every day with his wife, and the children doing their share; feeding the animals, cleaning the house and doing laundry once they were home from school. By adding the term “farm” to the list of target words, I confirmed that in the articles pertaining to rural living there was a stronger correlation between the terms “women” and “work” meaning that in rural lifestyle the ideals of equal opportunity and ‘everyone does their share’ were more prominent.
- Ben Wright, “The Great Depression”, The American Yawp, 26. https://www.loc.gov/item/wpalh001334/
- Sidney Asher, “Subway Stuff: Folk Talk”, Subway Stuff, 2. https://www.loc.gov/item/wpalh001334/
- Grace McCune, “Life History”, A Farming Preacher, 10. https://www.loc.gov/item/wpalh000533/
