Woman With No Class Quotes & Sayings

When I came back from Pakistan, I wanted to take computer classes nearby. I asked my brother. I was in my home, cooking for my family, and all our relatives and guests. But I said, "I want to live my life as a woman, but I want to study." But, he told me, "Just study at home, you don't need to go out." He said, "If you go to the courses, what will our relatives say? They will lose respect for us." They told me, "We know you're feeling different, but we cannot do anything about it." — Malina Suliman

I'm sorry."
"Don't worry, dear," the woman said brightly. "The day I encounter Sophia again, I'll grab the nearest heavy object and bludgeon her myself."
Arriane flung out a hand to help Luce up, pulling her so hard her feet shot off the ground. "Dee's an old friend. And a first-class party animal, might I add. Got the metabolism of a donkey. She almost brought the Crusades to a grinding halt the night she seduced Saladin."
"Oh, nonsense!" Dee said, flapping a hand dismissively.
"She's the best storyteller, too," Annabelle added. "Or she was before she dropped off the face of the earth. Where've you been hiding, woman?"
The woman drew a deep breath and her golden eyes dampened. "Actually, I fell in love."
"Oh, Dee!" Annabelle crooned, clasping the woman's hand. "How wonderful."
"Otto Z. Otto." The woman sniffed. "May he rest ... "
"Dr. Otto," Daniel said, stepping out of the doorway. "You knew Dr. Otto?"
"Backwards and forwards. — Lauren Kate

What does it mean to be cultured? Who is the cultured person? The cultured individual is not defined nor determined by status in society nor by wealth; but the cultured individual is determined and defined by his or her sense for the art of life. And what is the art of life? The art of life is the reflection of the mind and the soul upon the world, upon other people, upon the respect and understanding of other people and upon the things that are in this world and beyond. There is a joy that is always sought in beautiful things. Being cultured is being conscious, reflective, understanding, feeling, aware. Knowing how to feel, to listen, to understand. A desire to find or to create joy in many things - that is the art of life. And these things define a cultured person. — C. JoyBell C.

There's no hall of fame for that working class hero, no statue carved out of stone. And his greatest reward is the love of a woman and his children. — Alan Jackson

Hugh's old drawing teacher used to have one, and though it had been ten years since he'd taken the woman's class, I could suddenly recall him talking about it. "If I had a skeleton like Minerva's ... ," he used to say. I don't remember the rest of the sentence, as I'd always been sidetracked by the teacher's name, Minerva. Sounds like a witch. — David Sedaris

Woman was the test, but not every woman seemed to qualify. Black women, of course, were virtually invisible within the protracted campaign for woman suffrage. As for white working-class women, the suffrage leaders were probably impressed at first by the organizing efforts and militancy of their working-class sisters. But as it turned out, the working women themselves did not enthusiastically embrace the cause of woman suffrage. — Angela Y. Davis

No Latina woman would be called 'Ms.' - that's an invention of middle-class Anglo women. Latina women are proud to be called 'Mrs.' That simply means that we have a family. — Clarissa Pinkola Estes

This principle - that your spouse should be capable of becoming your best friend - is a game changer when you address the question of compatibility in a prospective spouse. If you think of marriage largely in terms of erotic love, then compatibility means sexual chemistry and appeal. If you think of marriage largely as a way to move into the kind of social status in life you desire, then compatibility means being part of the desired social class, and perhaps common tastes and aspirations for lifestyle. The problem with these factors is that they are not durable. Physical attractivess will wane, no matter how hard you work to delay its departure. And socio-economic status unfortunately can change almost overnight. When people think they have found compatibility based on these things, they often make the painful discovery that they have built their relationship on unstable ground. A woman "lets herself go" or a man loses his job, and the compatibility foundation falls apart. — Timothy Keller

My name is Lev," said Lev.
"My name is Lydia," said the woman. And they shook hands, Lev's hand holding the scrunched-up kerchief and Lydia's hand rough with salt and smelling of egg, and then Lev asked, "What are you planning to do in En gland?" and Lydia said, "I have some interviews in London for jobs as a translator."
"That sounds promising."
"I hope so. I was a teacher of English at School 237 in Yarbl, so my language is very colloquial."
Lev looked at Lydia. It wasn't difficult to imagine her standing in front of a class and writing words on a blackboard. He said, "I wonder why you're leaving our country when you had a good job at School 237 in Yarbl?"
"Well," said Lydia, "I became very tired of the view from my window. Every day, summer and winter, I looked out at the schoolyard and the high fence and the apartment block beyond, and I began to imagine I would die seeing these things, and I didn't want this. I expect you understand what I mean? — Rose Tremain

A man who graduated high in his class at Yale Law School and made partnership in a top law firm would be celebrated. A man who invested wisely would be admired, but a woman who accomplishes this is treated with suspicion. — Barbra Streisand

Few countries have produced such arrogance and snobbishness as America. Particularly is this true of the American woman of the middle class. She not only considers herself the equal of man, but his superior, especially in her purity, goodness, and morality. Small wonder that the American suffragist claims for her vote the most miraculous powers. In her exalted conceit she does not see how truly enslaved she is, not so much by man, as by her own silly notions and traditions. Suffrage can not ameliorate that sad fact; it can only accentuate it, as indeed it does. — Emma Goldman

Early eighteenth-century Italy saw facial powder at the center of the biggest scandal ever to befall a cosmetics manufacturer. A woman named Signora Toffana, who was well known in upper-class social circles, created a face powder that contained lead and arsenic and sold it to the wives of noblemen and the wealthy. The more affectionate the husband was with pecks on his wife's cheeks, the faster he died from the toxic powder. An estimated 600 husbands died this way, and Toffana was executed as an accomplice in their deaths. — Samuel S. Epstein

We think we value mothers in America, but we don't. We may revere motherhood, the hazy abstraction, the cream-of-wheat-with-a-halo ideal, but a mother is just a kind of woman, after all, and women are trouble and not so valuable. Low-income mothers drag down the country - why'd they have kids if they couldn't support them? Middle-class mothers are boring frumps. Elite ones are obsessed sanctimommies: Don't they know how annoying they are, with their yoga, their catfights over diapers and breastfeeding, their designer strollers that take up half the sidewalk so that people with important places to go have to take several extra steps? — Katha Pollitt

HIGGINS [sitting down beside her] Rubbish! you shall marry an ambassador. You shall marry the Governor-General of India or the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, or somebody who wants a deputy-queen. I'm not going to have my masterpiece thrown away on Freddy.

LIZA. You think I like you to say that. But I haven't forgot what you said a minute ago; and I won't be coaxed round as if I was a baby or a puppy. If I can't have kindness, I'll have independence.

HIGGINS. Independence? That's middle class blasphemy. We are all dependent on one another, every soul of us on earth.

LIZA [rising determinedly] I'll let you see whether I'm dependent on you. If you can preach, I can teach. I'll go and be a teacher.

HIGGINS. What'll you teach, in heaven's name?

LIZA. What you taught me. I'll teach phonetics.

HIGGINS. Ha! Ha! Ha! — George Bernard Shaw

A woman of class never admits to her artifices. — Gasmaskman

Women of a selected class, by the use of slaves and servants have become inactive, the mere recipients of values, no longer creators but "feeding on unearned wealth." This hurts their nature and debases the social fabric. If a woman does no labor in her home which could properly make her self-supporting outside that home she is in duty bound to do something outside her home to justify her claim to support. — Anna Garlin Spencer

Marriage and prostitution were two sides of one shield, the predatory man's exploitation of the sex-pleasure. The difference between them was a difference of class. If a woman had money she might dictate her own terms: equality, a life contract, and the legitimacy - that is, the property-rights - of her children. If she had no money, she was a proletarian, and sold herself for an existence. And — Upton Sinclair

Those who are truly decrepit, living corpses, so to speak, are the middle-aged, middle-class men and woman who are stuck in their comfortable grooves and imagine that the status quo will least forever or else are so frightened it won't, that they have retreated into their mental bomb shelters to wait it out. — Henry Miller

The idea of "common oppression" was a false and corrupt platform disguising and mystifying the true nature of women's varied and complex social reality. Women are divided by sexist attitudes, racism, class privilege, and a host of other prejudices. Sustained woman bonding can occur only when these divisions are confronted and the necessary steps are taken to eliminate them. — Bell Hooks

Everyone knew Sonja was destined for great things, but no one knew what to do with her until then. Even in academia, her natural habitat, she was an exotic species. Though her Russianness gave her certain dispensations, the idea that a young woman of any ethnicity could so excel in the hard sciences was a far-fetched fantasy. Their parents encouraged her at a distance. Neither understood the molecular formulas, electromagnetic fields, or anatomical minutiae that so captivated her, and so their support came by way of well-intentioned, inadequate generalities. Even after Sonja graduated secondary school at the top of her class and matriculated to the city university biology department, their parents found more to love in Natasha. Sonja's gifts were too complex to be understood, and therefore less desirable. Natasha was beautiful and charming. They didn't need MDs to know how to be proud of her. — Anthony Marra

I had never had a direct experience of the holy in my life, for all that I tried to serve my god as seemed best to me, according to my gifts as we are taught. Except for Hallana. She was the only miracle that ever happened to me. The woman seems vastly oversupplied with gods. At one point, I accused her of having stolen my share, and she accused me of marrying her solely to sustain a proper average. The gods walk through her dreams as though strolling in a garden. I just have dreams of running lost through my old seminary, with no clothes, late for an examination of a class I did not know I had, and the like. — Lois McMaster Bujold

It is not in becoming a whore that a woman becomes an outlaw in this man's world; it is in the possession of herself, the ownership and effective control of her own body, her seperateness and distinctness, the integrity of her body as hers, not his. Prostitution may be against the written law, but no prostitute has defied the prerogatives or power of men as a class through prostitution. No prostitute provides any model for freedom or action in a world of freedom that can be used with intelligence and integrity by a woman; the model exists to entice counterfeit female sexual revolutionaries, gullible liberated girls, and to serve the men who enjoy them. — Andrea Dworkin

Deep down inside, I'm a selfish bastard, but I'm a selfish bastard that will love her in ways no other man ever will. She has been mine since that first day in English class, since the first time I kissed her and told her I loved her. And really, it's not my fault another man fell in love with the woman whose heart belongs to me. — Stevie J. Cole

Martha Ridgley had been a single, working-class woman with no children or close family. Her killer had never been caught, and her case was eventually forgotten.

But not by everyone - not by whoever had been paying the rent on Apartment #37 for over two decades until, for one reason or another, the lease was finally up.

The Woman in Apartment #37
by
John Mead
from
Book of the Dead — John Mead

Along with the concept of American Dream runs the notion that every man and woman is entitled to an opinion and to one vote, no matter how ridiculous that opinion might be or how uninformed the vote. It could be that the Borderer Presbyterian tradition of "stand up and say your rightful piece" contributed to the American notion that our gut-level but uninformed opinions are some sort of unvarnished foundational political truths. I have been told that this is because we redneck working-class Scots Irish suffer from what psychiatrists call "no insight". Consequently, we will never agree with anyone outside our zone of ignorance because our belligerent Borderer pride insists on the right to be dangerously wrong about everything while telling those who are more educated to "bite my ass! — Joe Bageant

It lies like a leper in purple, it sits like a dead thing smeared with gold. — Oscar Wilde

But too often men react to women in positions of power with misogyny, often in sexualized terms. I have heard men in such situations talk about how "I'd like to fuck that bitch and teach her a lesson," for example. That kind of reaction demonstrates that no matter what the class position of a man and woman, men can use the weapon of sexualized violence to attempt to assert their dominance. — Robert Jensen

To me, women's lib was mainly a white, upper-middle class affair of little use to a reservation Indian woman. — Mary Brave Bird

The liberal wing of the feminist movement may have improved the lives of its middle- and upper-class constituency
indeed, 1992 was the Year of the White Middle Class Woman
but since the leadership of this faction of the feminist movement has singled out black men as the meta-enemy of women, these women represent one of the most serious threats to black male well-being since the Klan. — Ishmael Reed

The woman, who belonged to the courtesan class, was celebrated for an embonpoint unusual for her age, which had earned for her the sobriquet of "Boule de Suif" (Tallow Ball). Short and round, fat as a pig, with puffy fingers constricted at the joints, looking like rows of short sausages; with a shiny, tightly-stretched skin and an enormous bust filling out the bodice of her dress, she was yet attractive and much sought after, owing to her fresh and pleasing appearance. Her face was like a crimson apple, a peony-bud just bursting into bloom; she had two magnificent dark eyes, fringed with thick, heavy lashes, which cast a shadow into their depths; her mouth was small, ripe, kissable, and was furnished with the tiniest of white teeth. — Guy De Maupassant

When I was 14, I told all the girls in my class that I wanted to be the first woman prime minister. Someone else beat me to that! — Cherie Blair

Suzy smiled and the whole class laughed at me, but when she spoke, I heard a new sound, not the song of an angel, but the words of a woman on a pedestal, coming down. — Taylor Mali

find it interesting that in history all one had to do to discredit a woman was label her a witch. How do we discredit a strong woman today?" The class stared back at Wilson, not understanding. And then it clicked. "You label her a bitch," I offered boldly. The — Amy Harmon

Through my willingness to train every day and to dig deep in the after-class ukemi sessions, over time I earned the respect and friendship of my training partners, who were mostly Japanese men sincerely surprised to find themselves training with an American woman. — Linda Holiday

To make an omelette, you need not only those broken eggs but someone 'oppressed' to beat them: every revolutionist is presumed to understand that, and also every woman, which either does or does not make 51 percent of the population of the United States a potentially revolutionary class. — Joan Didion

With a woman of sophistication, class and modesty and refinement, I become a totally tongue-tied buffoon. I can't even look her straight in the face. — Iain Glen

Thus, towards the end of the eighteenth century a change came about which, if I were rewriting history, I should describe more fully and think of greater importance than the Crusades or the Wars of the Roses. The middle-class woman began to write. For if Pride and Prejudice matters, and Middlemarch and Villette and Wuthering Heights matter, then it matters far more than I can prove in an hour's discourse that women generally, and not merely the lonely aristocrat shut up in her country house among her folios and her flatterers, took to writing. — Virginia Woolf

To-day well, my Utopia, if ever I framed one, would be a land where the laws demanded that people should be vicious. Then one would be able to count at any rate on a little virtue. If no man might live with a woman in any but an irregular union, there would be at once quite a run on honest matrimony and the Law Courts would be full of desperately wicked monogamists; while if every one was expected to steal and swindle, there would soon be an extensive criminal class who respected property. — Edward Verrall Lucas

The specific character of [women's] oppression cannot be explained away by equating different situations through superficial and childish simplifications[:]

It is true that both the woman and the male worker are condemned to silence by their exploitation. But under the current system, the worker's wife is also condemned to silence by her worker-husband. In other words, in addition to the class exploitation common to both of them, women must confront a particular set of relations that exist between them and men, relations of conflict and violence that use physical differences as their pretext. — Thomas Sankara

That was what stuck in the craws of all the good women of Deptford: Mrs Dempster had not been raped, as a decent woman would have been - no, she had yielded because a man wanted her. The subject was not one that could be freely discussed even among intimates, but it was understood without saying that if women began to yield for such reasons as that, marriage and society would not last long. Any man who spoke up for Mrs Dempster probably believed in Free Love. Certainly he associated sex with pleasure, and that put him in a class with filthy thinkers like Cece Athelstan. — Robertson Davies

At a time when she was engaged to Stilton Cheesewright, I remember recording in the archives that she was tall and willowy with a terrific profile and luxuriant platinum blond-hair, the sort of girl who might, as far as looks were concerned, have been the star unit of the harem of one of the better-class sultans. — P.G. Wodehouse

One does so hate to admit that the average woman is kinder, finer, more quick of sympathy and on the whole so much more first class than the average man. — Sherwood Anderson

She exclaimed, the innate respectability of the middle-class housewife rising impulsively to the surface through the acquired dilettantism of the 'light woman.'
People who enjoyed 'picking-up' things, who admired poetry, despised sordid calculations of profit and loss, and nourished ideals of honour and love, she placed in a class by themselves, superior to the rest of humanity. — Marcel Proust

The confidence is really driven by the woman - whether she can have the confidence that there will be enough earning or income to finance all the domestic spending - but also by the middle-income class, which for many Asian countries has become the growth power for the economy. — Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Atheism can benefit no class of people; neither the unfortunate, whom it bereaves of hope, nor the prosperous, whose joys it renders insipid, nor the soldier, of whom it makes a coward, nor the woman whose beauty and sensibility it mars, nor the mother, who has a son to lose, nor the rulers of men, who have no surer pledge of the fidelity of their subjects than religion. — Francois-Rene De Chateaubriand

I certainly would like to prevent, if I could legally, anybody having an abortion, a rich woman, a middle-class woman, or a poor woman. Unfortunately, the only vehicle available is the ... Medicaid bill. — Henry Hyde

I'm very worried about the depiction of women on the screen. It's gotten worse than ever and it's related to their being either high- or low-class concubines, and the only question is when or where they will go to bed, with whom, and how many. There's nothing to do with the dreams of women, or of woman as the dream, nothing to do with the quirky part of her, the wonder of her. — John Cassavetes

Lives in previous centuries for women are largely a matter of class. It would have been fun to have been a rich, privileged woman in the 18th century, but no fun at all to be her maid. — Antonia Fraser

As soon as you opened your mouth and said the word woman, you were beaten down with the argument that you were betraying the class struggle. There are many poignant writings in which feminists first write pages about their class standpoint before getting to their actual issue. What was then known as class warfare is today called anti-racism. The threat of being accused of racism gave birth to false tolerance. — Alice Schwarzer

Because I believe that deep down in woman's nature lies slumbering the spirit of revolt.
Because I believe that woman is enslaved by the world machine, by sex conventions, by motherhood and its present necessary child-rearing, by wage-slavery, by middle-class morality, by customs, laws and superstitions.
Because I believe that woman's freedom depends upon awakening that spirit of revolt within her against these things which enslave her.
Because I believe that these things which enslave woman must be fought openly, fearlessly, consciously. — Margaret Sanger

At Brandies I discovered Feminism. And I instantly became a convert ... writing brilliant papers in my Myths of Patriarchy class, in which I likened my fate as a woman to other victims throughout the ages. — Heather Hart

It should not be a surprise to find that s/m fantasy is significant in women's sex lives. Women may be born free but they are born into a system of subordination. We are not born into equality and do not have equality to eroticise. We are not born into power and do not have power to eroticise. We are born into subordination and it is in subordination that we learn our sexual and emotional responses. It would be surprising indeed if any woman reared under male supremacy was able to escape the forces constructing her into a member of an inferior slave class. — Sheila Jeffreys