The Art of Social Navigation — Little Women

Amy drags Jo into the social rite of calling, half a dozen visits in one day, a promise Jo instantly regrets. Jo loathes the ritual of cards, costumes, and careful speech, but Amy insists bargains must be kept. They dress, rehearse names, and sally forth with Jo's elbows decidedly akimbo at this period of her life.

The calls become a comedy of class signals. Jo is blunt with people she likes and cold with people she should flatter. Amy catalogs every blunder. The climax is social arithmetic: Jo bows politely to Tommy Chamberlain, whose father keeps a grocery store, while giving a cool nod to Laurie, who is wealthy and dear. Amy says she should have reversed the nod and the bow.

Jo refuses the logic of snobbery even while learning that manners have rules. The chapter is Amy's curriculum in navigation and Jo's resistance to it. Calls are not friendship; they are maps of power, and Amy wants Jo to read them before Jo's pride costs someone else another opportunity, as it soon will at the fair.