I really like how the help is written. She depicts all of the characters in the book and their own unique personality very well. I think that the help plays into a lot of the questions about the American dream and how race, gender and social class play into your power and how others treat you.
      When then book starts you get to see how the maids are treated by there employers, the employers friends and the child that they are taking care of. The employers are usually much nicer to the help when their friends are not around and I think that plays into the race aspect because they want to put up a front for society in which the help is lower class and less important than whites which means you treat them so. The employers friends treat them with little respect because they do not know them on a personal level to the extent that the employer does so they treat them with a very cold attitude.  The children though are definitely the most interesting. On the one hand the children are very sweet and treat them as their equal. They love them and feel safe and comfortable with them and it doesn't seem as though that will change. On the other hand, as stated in the book; the children treat them right now and love them but as they grow up it will change because they see how others around them treat the help and so they too conform to society.  This I think is the most powerful thing, them maids saying that the children who they raised and loved and who loved them back will end up treating them exactly as their mamas do.
Eve Small