On May 5, Canadian politician Catherine McKenney and journalist Deborah Dundas congregated with Ottawa International Writers Festival attendees to discuss Dundas’ new book, On Class.
Over the course of the hour-long discussion, which included an audience question segment, Dundas shared her lived experiences and research into the realities of poverty.
By challenging stigmas surrounding economic class, the conversation illuminated what happens when we push past our comfort zones.
“I’ve always felt the topic of class is important. It isn’t something we talk about publicly, though,” Dundas said.
The author, who is currently a books editor at the Toronto Star, grew up in a working class family. At eight years old, her parents divorced, and Dundas went on to 11 different schools and 15 different apartments throughout her childhood.
Dundas’ vast life experiences molded her understanding of class and poverty issues.
“The idea that you can pull yourself up by your bootstraps in this society is a common myth,” she explained. “The system is not working for you.”
The OECD reports on average, it takes 150 years for a child in a low-income family to reach an average-income level. Dundas said that growing up in poverty limited her options and perspective.
“When you’re working class and your [parents] split up, and there’s a couple of kids, there’s no money for anything. Your opportunities get closed off. Your way of looking at things gets closed off,” she said.
Throughout the talk, McKenney highlighted the false narratives they’ve heard, both when living as a single parent in poverty and as a political figure in Ottawa.
“Today, poverty is often referred to as [the result] of making poor decisions and being your own fault,” they said.
“We talk about so many things, and class intersects them all. If we don’t talk about class, then we’re leaving out a big factor that informs people’s lives and choices they can make,” Dundas told the Charlatan.
McKenney praised the power of having a book like On Class.
“[On Class] feels like a little manifesto,” they said. “It feels like something I’m going to carry around for a long time because… we don’t always have the language or the examples that we need to talk about class and poverty.”
Discussion attendee Maria Seastres left the event feeling open to discussing class in other settings.
“I like that [Dundas’] goal is to start the conversation because talking about class is not comfortable or easy,” Seastres said.
Dundas said she felt that sentiment when speaking with event attendees during her book signing.
“What struck me was that every single person in that lineup wanted to have a conversation. They had a point of view and experience with class,” she said.
She explained that this human connection is necessary in maintaining ongoing discussions surrounding politics, economic class and privilege.
“There’s no one way to talk about issues. To get a full sense of the world and what we’re talking about, we need to bring class into it. Everybody is part of a class.”
Featured image by Kyra Vellinga/The Charlatan.
