Okay kiddo, imagine you're playing with your favorite toy and somebody comes along and wants to take it away from you. How would you feel?
Well, there is a grown-up lady named Arlie Russell Hochschild who is very interested in how people feel about things like this. But not just about toys, she wants to understand how people feel about very important things like their jobs, their families, and their communities.
Ms. Hochschild spent many years talking to people who live in the southern part of the United States to try to understand why they feel the way they do about certain things. She discovered that some people feel like their jobs are really important, even more important than their families sometimes. And they also feel a strong connection to their communities and want to protect them.
But sometimes they feel like nobody is listening to them, and that their opinions and feelings are being ignored. Ms. Hochschild calls this feeling being in a "deep story."
She explains it like this: Imagine you're watching a movie or reading a book, and you get really into the story. You feel like you're a part of it and you care what happens to the characters. That's kind of like how these people feel about their jobs and communities. They have a deep story about why these things are important, and they want other people to care too.
So, Ms. Hochschild wants to help people understand each other's deep stories and why they matter. She thinks that if we listen to each other more, we can come up with solutions to problems that work for everybody.
That's what Arlie Russell Hochschild is all about: helping people understand each other better and find ways to make things better together.