To find the term 'underclass' offensive and to think teachers shouldn't be teaching students about it?

[Opalite]

I was talking to DD and she was saying how her teacher told the class about 'underclass, working class, middle class and upper class' we were watching TV and it mentioned middle class, DD said that we're underclass and her teacher had told her about it yesterday
Is it outdated? I find it offensive and I don't think it's right for her teacher to be telling them these things as if they're facts or as if they matter

Clearly it means different things to different people.
Some see it as a term for 'feckless benefit scroungers' ie those who can be blamed for their situation (and presumably their next sentence would include the phrase 'hard working families')

I'd use the term to describe the dispossessed, slipped through the net people.

Inevitably we over simplify when we give a label to any group of people, things are always more nuanced than the label suggests

The OPs DD wouldn't fall into any of those categories though.

I'd like to know how the teacher categorised the different classes to make her think she was 'underclass'

Yes mrsdevere

I would describe 'underclass' as the people below the working class ie: the people whom survive entirely on benefits. It's just a sociological/ economic term surely. You can't describe someone who doesn't work or possibly has never worked as working class?

How can you describe someone as MC then?

Surely the MC work?

So everyone who works is therefore WC.

But the MC have other characteristics. I would consider the underclass to have once been working class but now not work.

Can you not see that the term has negative connotations though Orange?

Under = beneath less than

I don't like terms that define purely by finances though.

Does someone from a middle class background who falls on hard times and exists solely on benefits suddenly become underclass?

Does someone who has never worked but won the euromillions suddenly become upper class?

MrsD, yes. The underclass has come to mean [to some] 'criminal class' or 'scrounging class

It is demonisation of the poor.

So only WC people can become underclass then?

I would consider the underclass to have once been working class but now not work

What about someone who would be defined as middle class, but who now lives on benefits?

A MC person who finds themselves homeless and jobless or living solely on benefits is just an unemployed MC person.

But a WC person who finds themselves in the same circumstances is now 'underclass'

That can't be right,surely.

That just goes to show that underclass does in fact mean much more to individuals than they are happy to let on.

I see the underclass as a group who have no prospects.

Trapped in poverty and unable to work or find their way to any kind of life which is above basic subsistence.

Someone who is educated but falls on hard times has a better chance of not getting stuck in the underclass, but there may be factors that conspire against them, eg mental illness.

Or a person with fewer qualifications may have a good support network and be able to find a way to improve their economic situation.

Or any number of alternative situations.
Few people can be totally immune to slipped through the net and ending up potless.

Slipping!

To be MC, IMO, you need a higher level of education. So I would find it harder to see a MC person becoming underclass through losing their job.

In my mind, underclass, are those people that have both a limited education and no work history.

Being on benefits doesn't necessarily happen purely from losing your job.

Illness/disability can happen to anyone/anyones children. That can be a factor in that kind of scenario.

Having a degree doesn't protect a person from hardship like that.

I personally know a woman with two PHDs who exists on benefits because of disability. Is she not underclass then?

No. In purely my opinion, the underclass is someone who leaves school with no, or only a few GCSE's. It is someone who possibly then has a child and never works. Someone who spends years and years living totally on benefits.

It is not someone who falls on hard times.

And I know it sounds harsh, but I think it would be naive to pretend this group of people don't exist, or lump them in with the WC, which, IMO would be a great injustice to the latter.

It is a demonisation of the poor. Especially in the present climate
Make anyone, or any group 'sub' or 'under' and there's a problem.
What about the people employed in shipbuilding in Portsmouth? Next year, will they be 'underclass'?
If you're talking about a group who need benefits to keep afloat then in the main that is people who work, including me.

or lump them in with the WC, which, IMO would be a great injustice to the latter

orangejuicesandwich and there you have articulated the 'workers versus shirkers' argument in a nutshell!

Orange, you see the underclass as a group of people who deserve their lowly status?

Not that things are ever that clear cut, we all get where we get via some combination of good or bad luck and good or bad judgment!

I think it depends how intelligently the teacher introduced it. There is a world of difference between saying "those people are the underclass" and "some people use the term underclass to describe people who have the following common characteristics or traits" I don't think you can introduce discussions around class in a simplistic way (and I have taught sociology in school - but it was in the Jurassic period )

Wikipedia has a great article outlining the key debates huge arguments between academics on the use of the term
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underclass

Why the Amberleaf? Do you not believe there are people who never work? And do you not think to call them WC and put them in the same socio-economic category as say a nurse or a builder would be wrong?