Pg 115-116.
Mrs Ericson is a very sweet, kind and fun-loving person she is anything but racist. She employs Marian as a sort of maid to clean and look after the children. She shows her great sense of thankfulness to Marian when she is said to have wondered for the thousandth time, "How the house had ever managed to get along without her." She continually compliments Marian and her driving and this shows us her sweet and kind personality. We tend to be positioned by the author to like Mr Ericson because of her complimentary attitude and non racist approach towards Marian.
The driving instructor is extremely off-putting during the Test and is had a very racist and stereotypical attitude to the way he treated Marian. He treated her as uneducated and unfairly. His racist attitude came through clearly in only one line which was, "He began to whistle "Swanee River"" and then asked, "Make you homesick." (Pg 116) In a very stereotypical was as if she was a typical black that came from down south. Also when he said, "Old enough to have quite a flock of piccaninnies," (Pg 116) we see his racism come through. This racism causes us to be positioned to dislike the instructor because we already have been positioned to agree with and like Marian.
A lot of chit chat and warm fuzzy talk between Marian and Mrs Ericson which reveals their relationship. Through dialogue we find out about Mrs Ericson's warm nature and excellent complimentary attitude towards Marian. Pg 115.
The plot in the story starts off with Mrs Ericson having a high confidence in Marian and she expresses this through speech like, "You drive beautifully Marian." Then after the driving inspectors have turned up and Mrs Ericson leaves the racism starts. Lines that include the words, "Swanee River," and "Piccaninnies," (Pg 116) we see the racism from the driving instructors. Marian gets so angry she yells at the driving instructor and therefore fails the test.