It’s about 2,000 miles from Berkeley, California, to the bayous of Louisiana. But the geographic distance pales in comparison to how far away the liberal California college town and the red-state politics of a Tea Party stronghold are on the political spectrum.

Arlie Russell Hochschild, professor emerita of sociology at the University of California, Berkeley, spent years working to bridge that gap in her latest book, "Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right."

The liberal sociologist spent time in Louisiana to get beyond the easy stereotypes and understand what drives people from a low-income and working-class community to embrace conservative politics — what she calls the red-state paradox.

"How could it be that the poorest states, the states with the worst education, the worst health, the lowest life expectancy, were the ones that received the most federal money but were more suspicious and negative about the federal government?" Russell Hochschild said.

Louisiana is at the center of this paradox, the author said. The state receives approximately 44 percent of its budget from the federal government, making it the poorest state in the country last year. Yet it was a state that went for Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee and political outsider who has stated he's in favor of dissolving several federal departments.

Russell Hochschild spent five years in the bayous of Louisiana getting to know people in an effort to cross an "empathy bridge" into the experience of people she was pleased to have met, but with whom she has great political differences. She visited their classrooms, went fishing with locals and attended gumbo cookoffs.

All that time led her to better understand the deeper story. She said if you were to tell it as a metaphor it would be like this:

"You're waiting in line, as in a pilgrimage, sort of leading up to a point at the top of the hill where you can find the American dream. And you feel very deserving. You have worked your butt off. And you're waiting in line for this American dream, and you notice suddenly that somebody is butting in front. Who is that? Well, it's an affirmative-action black who is getting access to jobs previously denied to blacks. Or a woman, a career-minded woman, who is trying to get access to a job that was formerly reserved for men. And then migrants and immigrants and refugees. All these people seem to be getting ahead of you in line. The line is now moving backwards. And then you see someone to the side of it. That would be (president) Barack Obama, who seems to be waving to the people cutting in line in cahoots with him. Then you feel like the government isn't helping me, it's helping them. And then finally you see somebody ahead of you in line who is turning around saying, 'Oh, you white cracker, you redneck, you uneducated ignorant southerner.' And they feel insulted for all the pain of first trying to move forward in line, and then being pushed back."

We're all inside a giant paradox, said Russell Hochschild. The public square has turned hostile, but as we retreat to our more private lives among friends and neighbors, there is a reconciliation and understanding that often doesn't exist in the larger dialogue. Because after all, she said, underneath all the talk of politics and value, we all have a deep story to tell, and that takes some grappling with to understand.