"I'll Be There"

One of the most touching scenes in the novel. Feeling the pain of the death of his friend, Tom shares with his Ma' some good old words of wisdom:
"Whenever they's a fight so hungry people can eat, I'll be there. Whenever they's a cop beatin' up a guy, I'll be there... I'll be in the way guys yell when they're mad an'-I'll be in the way kids laugh when they're hungry an' they know supper's ready. An' when our folks eat the stuff they raise an' live in the houses they build-why, I'll be there."
Here, you can really hear how Tom feels unified with the rest of his social class. The working class, poor, struggling families: they are all united together because of a shared experience. In this way, the upper class, mainly depicted by banks and corporations become much less part of the human experience. They are completely dehumanized and instead associated with the immobile and the material. What I mean is, while the migrants are seen laboring the fields, moving across the land, etc...the privileged class is simply portrayed by corporations and not as a unified group. There are no human qualities attributed to them.
By contrast, Tom and the rest of the migrants, despite their suffering, really seem to be part of the "human experience."