To ask what the social classes are?

[nicea]

Never understood it.

Have only heard of working class, middle class etc and wouldn't know how to identify someone as one.

What are the classes and the stereotypes/generalisations linked to them?

That survey is a pile of a crap though isn't it...?!

BTW I just did the BBC class test and my answers put me in the Elite bracket.... I’m not sure it works! As I just said above, was raised working class and feel very working class, but we do what I would consider middle class stuff, galleries and theatre, children learn musical instruments and all the kinds of things that weren’t even considered for me as a child. We go on decent holidays. Again, I don’t believe you can change class until the next generation comes along.

Drapes
Curtains
Nets or blinds

It's that simple

Although rather old and somewhat dated as well as being full of stereotypes, may I refer you to Jilly Cooper's book entitled "Class"?
It is not an academic book, rather more social observation, but amusing and might give you some clues on decoding the system and definitions around class.

Drapes is America though?!

Sofa / settee
Napkin / serviette
Sitting room / lounge

I’m scum of the earth, I think I’ll do the bbc test and see if it agrees

If you shop in waitrose you are middle class
If your child's face is clean you are working class
If you own a toilet brush you are part of the underclass

Kate Fox’s ‘watching the English’ Is the best guide to U.K. class.

Middle class is divided into lower middle, middle middle, and upper middle.

I was born into lower middle. Most of my friends left school at 16 to work in a bank. Everyone washed their cars on a Sunday. Read the DM or the Express.

I aspired to be like a friend's family, which was middle middle. They had coasters, glass of wine with dinner (not tea), went on holidays to France, rather than a package to Spain or the Med.

Went to university and realised that there was an entire layer above - upper middle. No coasters, scruffy clothes, dented cars, public schools, lived in tumbling down vicarages or three story Victorian town houses. Parents always seemed to be pissed by 4pm.

Only had one upper class friend. She had an actual lake and a church in her garden. Sat next to couple of millionaire heirs at "supper" once.

Class definitely still exists.

So I’m definitely working class - not uni educated and moment if my family were etc
Let’s say I decided to go to University and studied to be a lawyer
My class wouldn’t change...
But would my son’s? What about when he has children?

Watching the English is very good.

Isn't that social mobility?
Do you own a toilet brush?

None of my family were that should say!

If you’re asking me - yes, I own a toilet brush.
Would I have to throw that away? Or perform some ceremonial burning?

As others have said it's not so much about how much you earn but more about where you have come from, your culture capital and your views and beliefs.

Upper class - Royal family, aristocracy, people with titles and land that have been in their family for centuries. Anyone with an officially registered family crest. Think opera, ballet, theatre and the Arts.

Middle class - families with history in the professions or politics, think doctors, judges, barristers and solicitors, MPs, civil servants etc. Children are privately educated.

Skilled working class - plumbers, electricians, mechanics, gas technicians, joiners, operators of complex heavy machinery (cranes, trains, trams), locksmiths, carpet fitters, painters and decorators etc. Some children may make it to grammar school.

Working class - minimum wage jobs working in retail or customer services, labourers, cleaners, bin men, postman, delivery driver, truck, bus driver, taxi driver etc. State educated.

Underclass - benefit cheats, never worked a day in their lives and neither have their parents or their 50 year old grand parents, history of criminal convictions and substance abuse in the family. Fond of cigarettes, booze and gambling. Somehow manages to have the biggest TV and the latest IPhone.

There is a huge range of stratification within "middle class". my family and DH's are both very definitely "middle class" but are absolutely obviously several rungs of social strata steps apart from one another.

No I'm sorry. You have owned one and therefore you and your entire line are doomed to the underclass. I'll see you there, at least we'll have sparkling loos.

Damn. I knew that the purchase of that toilet brush would come back to bite me.

I say napkin and I am most definitely working class.

100% working class as is almost everyone I know. No one under 50 has nets these days

Ime people at the top and bottom have more in common with each other than with those in the middle.

UC/MC inherit furniture the WC buy it

I find the ABC1C2DE link to wiki totally inaccurate. It puts my grandparents as working class, my parents making it to lower middle, and I'm now middle class, but my some working class.
The BBC questionnaire has me as there version of scum class.
As a family we class ourselves as working class, worked hard to move up in our roles during our lives. Always started at the bottom and bloody worked hard.

Class mobility is a thing but takes generations - a family I know,
Grandad/ manual worker, worked his way up eventually starting his own company = Working class
Father/ manual worker, worked his way up, went into business with his Father = working class
Children/ grew up when Father & Grandfather own the business, go to university and get professional jobs = middle class

I learnt a lot from Watching the English, but I didn't agree with it all. For example, the author said something about how the English are known for their literature, but not for their music. Eh? She also seemed quite biased for a researcher as it was obvious she saw upper class culture as correct and working class culture as incorrect. I don't see it that way; different doesn't mean "wrong".

I thought my DF's family were middle-class as both his parents went to university. Granddad went to Oxford and became a teacher. DF went to grammar school. But according to this thread, they were working class, although clearly not in the same bracket as DM's family, who were hardworking but poor and tended to leave school at 14.

Augusta Kate Fox is I think married to Henry Marsh who wrote a book about being a neurosurgeon - it is called First Do No Harm. This is totally bye the bye but it’s a fascinating book and who the hell would want to be a neurosurgeon.

I often feel I have a foot in two classes. I’m early 30s and come from an unquestionably working class family (father an electrician in a mine, mother nhs worker, both left school at 15 but worked hard all throughout life. I have a working class outlook but I have been lucky enough to be the first in my family to go to uni. I now do a job which still has working class roots but pays above what my school peers would probably be paid. Not difficult when I come from a part of the UK which is often described as being one of the poorest places in Europe.

In my work, I mix with lots of middle class people, people I would never have come into contact with otherwise and for them, class is nothing. They don’t notice when they buy avacado and hummous that it’s completely new to someone like me. Or when they casually talk about their christmases that there were times I had to be looked after at short notice by family on Christmas Day when both of my parents had to work. They also don’t realise that middle class people get incentives to do the right thing when working class people get punished for doing the wrong thing. My father was nearly sacked after his company fitted a tracker on his van and he made an ‘unsuthorised’ visit to the wholesalers after running out of cable. They then denied him access to his trade union. Illegal I know, but justice costs.

Also the middle class people I work with are on the right side of the awful health inequalities that come from living in an area as poor as mine, where 15 miles can mean the difference of ten years life expectancy. Being on the right side means they barely notice it and they don’t have to deal with the burden of care placed on relatives in quite the same way as often if their family needs care there is paid help available.

Class isn’t always how much money you have, it’s what you eat, what you feel comfortable doing, how and where you socialise, how you deal with things if everything goes wrong etc. It’s hard to override class sometimes but anyone who argues that it doesn’t exist needs to live a day in my life because it absolutely does.