The Unlikely Secret Agent - Essay Example

Eleanor’s race, class and gender affected how others saw and treated her in ways that were advantageous and disadvantageous to her, and these advantages would not have been present for working-class black men; also, however different she may be to those directly affected by apartheid, she was still effective in opposing it because she showed that these differences did not justify the inhumanity of apartheid, and that her race, class, and gender also led to similar experiences of oppression. Eleanor’s race and class are advantages for her because they helped her elude suspicions and maltreatment.

Eleanor is not black or a Jewish man, but a Scottish woman who is romantically involved with a Jew. Because of her race, she evaded the initial roundups of the Secret Police who targeted male Jews and blacks first. In addition, her race had been a good source of prevention of police brutality that normally showed against anti-apartheid demonstrators. Eleanor remembered that it was possible that without the presence of the white couple, Harold and Maggy Strachan, heading a rally and facing armed policemen ready to fire, another massacre of black working-class protesters would have followed the Sharpville Massacre (39).

Because of her class, she also earned some form of respect. As a middle-class South African, she was also not an immediate target of suspicion, for how many middle-class people would sacrifice their comfortable social status for the risks involved in fighting against the apartheid? In addition, Eleanor had a bookstore, and so she was also able to order subversive books from America and use it as a front line for sending and receiving messages for ANC members. Her class provided money and social status that enabled her to serve the ANC and to end apartheid.

As a woman, Eleanor also accessed greater social support, respect, and care than men. Eleanor’s gender was a source of social support. She remembered being imprisoned