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Personal Narrative: The Myth Of Meritocracy

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According to the ideology of the American dream, the United States is the land of the free and its society offers the possibility of rising up the social ladder as far as their efforts take them. Being "free" means being able to control your own life, the directions you might take, understanding and determining choices. There are several social forces that limit our freedom. The main force, being able to make a difference in your own life. Education has helped me achieve a lot in life. For example, being in school has taught me how difficult it can be living on my own. It is a secure way of ensuring a steady paying job in the future. This has given me insight to inequalities by others not having the same educational opportunities as me. In class we discussed something called the "Myth of Meritocracy". The "Myth of Meritocracy" is the idea that peoples success and failures are a result of "merit"- if you work hard enough you will succeed in whatever you attempt to accomplish.

Many Americans have managed to become socially mobile. James Loewen, social mobility is "the movement from one social class to another- becoming more wide-spread in America". This meant that people had a better chance to move upward in society". The stress on upward mobility is …show more content…
I knew that racism was fairly common in our society, but not to the extent it actually is. Racism is a very hurtful thing that our society needs to work on to try and avoid. I think that once racism is acknowledged the problem can be addressed and attempt to fix the problem accordingly. I don't believe racism can be fixed, but people can be more informed on racism, and do what they can to prevent it. I really enjoyed learning a lot of the material we covered in class. Most of it I slightly knew about, but I now have much more insight about the material and an overall better

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