The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class In The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class by David Roediger, we are able to examine the antebellum era with emphasis on class formation and the fluidity of racial boundaries in popular culture. According to Roediger, mobbing, blackface and minstrelsy are key elements in the formation of the white-working class. During the antebellum time period, Blacks were victimized by the white mobs. The African – American community as a whole endured tremendous social injustice. The mobs wanted Blacks to be disassociated from