Rylie Capezzuto
At the start of this semester, as a first year student, I didn’t really know what to expect when it came to an English class about the 2008 housing crisis. Honestly, I came into this class with little to no knowledge about the crisis. And now ending this class in these cold winter months, not only do I have a vast understanding about the topic, but I have also been given resources, that may not initially seem like it could tie to the 2008 crisis, but from reading in between the lines and trying to think deeper about the subject matter I was able to. That deeper understanding, in my opinion, helped so much more and made it so much easier to learn about the destructive disaster that was the 2008 financial crisis. I’m leaving this class believing that we, as a society, could greatly benefit from a class like this because it provides us with a new outlook on the disasters like catastrophe of 2008 that we can work together in order to prevent.
The 2008 financial crisis will forever be a very defining moment in economic history. It was a real world event that exposed how fragile the global financial system really was. It was triggered by the collapse of the housing market, the failure of major banks and the mortgage lending crisis. In the novel, The Big Short, it states, “If we’re right, people lose homes, people lose jobs, people lose retirement savings, people lose pensions. You know what I hate about banking? It reduces people to numbers.” This also ties in with the subprime mortgages, which are loans given to people with poor credit, which was a key factor in the crisis. When the housing prices began to fall, many people who were given these subprime loans were now unable to pay their mortgages. Since they were unable to pay, their houses were foreclosed. The crisis led to many people becoming unemployed, especially in the real estate market and left many Americans struggling to keep their homes and stay afloat. The effects of the crisis were widespread, which caused many houses to become foreclosed, the collapse of many financial institutions and the global recession that impacted millions of people throughout the whole world. On the other hand, Parable of the Sower, is a dystopian novel that envisions a future that is destroyed by economic collapse, environmental destruction and social uncertainty. It’s easy to draw connections between the two, especially considering that the novel portrays a world that is very similar to the one that people experienced in 2008.
It’s important to understand the setting of the novel Parable of the Sower and how it has connections to the 2008 financial crisis. Parable of the Sower is set in a future America that has fallen into a mass chaos due to climate change, economic inequality and a breakdown of society as a whole. The rich people live in gated communities, away from the chaos, while the poor people struggle to survive in a world that has extreme violence and an economic collapse. As stated in the text, “The rich are getting richer, and the poor are getting poorer, and everybody’s in danger.” People are forced to fend for themselves due to the government no longer providing support to the people. The main character of the novel, Lauren Olamina, has the ability to feel other people’s pain and throughout the novel discover a new belief system which aims to help people adapt to the world that is falling apart all around them.
In both cases, there is a common theme of a breakdown in the economic system that causes social and personal distress. In Parable of the Sower, the economic collapse is worsened by environmental destruction,”The System is failing. The people are failing.”, and in the 2008 crisis, it was a result of corporate greed and unchecked financial mishaps. Both events also revealed deep inequality in society. The novel’s description of the rich being walled off from the poor reflects how wealthier people were less affected by the 2008 crisis compared to the lower income residents that lost their homes.
The way the characters in Parable of the Sower responded to the collapse of their world is also something that stuck out to me in relation to the main focus points of this class. Lauren creating Earthseed is a representation of the lack of trust that is in traditional systems of society. This was represented in the text by saying, “There’s no time for apathy. You have to act. You have to care.” As a religious belief system, Earthseed states that the way for humanity to survive and progress is dependent on adaptability. This belief system promotes the idea that “God is Change” and emphasizes the need to embrace change in order to prosper. Earthseed is a way for people to organize themselves, be able to form communities and find a sense of belonging and hope in this novel’s uncertain future.
In the real world, the response to the 2008 crisis is less of creating a belief system to prosper but still aimed at finding solutions that will fix a broken financial system. We learned throughout the semester, through books, podcasts and documentaries, that the federal government intervened with bailouts to businesses and some reforms were created to prevent any crises to this extent to happen in the future. We learned that while this recovery was helpful, it was a very slow process, and many Americans were left on their own to deal with the aftermath of the crisis without much financial support. This crisis left a lasting impact on many people who were affected by it and left many to distrust financial institutions as a whole.
The way the characters in Parable of the Sower came together in the face of destruction is opposite to how the real-world responses seemed to be very small in the grand scheme of the destruction the crisis did to many people. The quote,”We have to learn to thrive in a world that is coming apart.” shows how even though the book is fictional, the subject matters are all too apparent in the real world. The 2008 crisis revealed a deep divide in society between the wealthy that came out of the destruction with only scratches and bruises while the poor came out weathered and immensely injured. The crisis and its aftermath exposed many flaws in the financial system and the limits of economic responses to a crisis at that magnitude.
The novel’s world shows an exaggerated version of the kind of economic uncertainty that was due to a financial crisis, but in many ways, it shows us the potential consequences of ignoring pressing systemic issues, as said in the text, “It’s easier to destroy than to create.” Parable of the Sower encourages readers to reflect on the underlying causes of climate change, wealth inequality, and the lack of trust in institutions, and think critically about how these factors might play out in real world situations.
When we read Parable of the Sower during class, and we were able to connect our prior knowledge of the 2008 crisis, we were reminded just how fragile economic systems are and how when they fail the consequences can be very extreme. While the 2008 crisis was a financial one, Parable of the Sower suggests that the real issue lies in our ability to adapt and how we respond to change. This is backed up by the quote, “We don’t have a choice. We have to make the best of the world we’ve got.” The crisis revealed how unprepared many people were for the collapse of the economic system and the novel encourages us to think about how we might be able to create systems that are more sustainable, and more adaptable in the face of potential future crises.
For me, reading Parable of the Sower in light of the 2008 crisis has been eye opening. It made me think more deeply about the long term effects of the economic systems and how important it is to address inequality before it may lead to disaster. The book challenges the idea that society will always be able to bounce back after a crisis, which was an assumption that was often made in the aftermath of the 2008 destruction. But instead, the novel offers a vision of the future that is surrounded by a need for change, both on a personal level and as a society as a whole.
Finally, reflecting on how engaging with Parable of the Sower and the 2008 financial crisis connects to GLOBE’s goal of helping Geneseo students reflect on changes in learning and outlook over time is important. This process of reflection allows myself and other students to not only understand how our perspectives shift as we learn but also helps us engage with real world problems in more meaningful ways. By going in depth with the connections between the novel and the real world financial crisis, I was able to better understand and appreciate the importance of thinking critically about social, economic and environmental issues. I believe, as students, we are encouraged to not only think about what we learn in the classroom but also how our learning can shape our views of the world. I was challenged to question the status quo and envision new ways of responding to crises in both our personal lives and in society.
In conclusion, reading Parable of the Sower alongside the 2008 financial crisis shows us how economic collapse and social instability are connected, and how important it is to adapt when things fall apart. Even though the novel is fictional, it helps us think about the real world effects of system failures and why resilience and working together is so important. By looking at these connections, I can better understand how the world works and think about what I can do to make things better in the future. Engaging with Parable of the Sower this way encourages us to reflect on how we learn and grow over time, which is exactly what GLOBE wants students at Geneseo to practice.