These People are Not Your People: Class Conflict and Ideology in Faulkner's Sanctuary
According to William Faulkner's assessment, the mixing of the classes fails because very different ideologies have emerged and are in competition and conflict with one another. The discourses and therefore the ideologies of the characters in Sanctuary are seen to be in conflict with one another, with persons on opposing sides occupying positions that seem to be growing further and further apart, making communication more and more difficult. In examining the speech and interactions of these characters, the codes and knowledge of the different value systems may be analyzed. Sanctuary, then, is not a novel merely about good and evil; it is a novel about the breakdown of southern antebellum ideology and the new set of relations that began to emerge in the early twentieth century. Social class and ideology are central issues in Sanctuary, and Faulkner's novel demonstrates the ways in which class transgressions result in violence.
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