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?

Nowt to do with money. My godmother is a proper Lady and her eldest brother a Baron. There’s only titles, and no money or land in the family anymore - their grandfather was the last to live in the family seat before the bank foreclosed on it and evicted him. I’d say they’re upper class based on the fact they’re aristocracy.

I’d say we’re solidly middle class. Not rolling in disposable cash but ok, professional occupations, homeowner parents, private educations. My dads parents were middle class (business people) and my mums parents were working class (good old fashioned Yorkshire mining stock, as my grandma would say!).

DH is a leader in his field
We have all the trappings of an upper middle class life
We often mix with household names
DH still says he's working class - he never was really although his grandparents were.

Them and us

Do people without toilet brushes not poo?

Jug of hottish tap water down toilet pan does the trick.

When you walk round the "poor end" of the parish of the church you attend and think that "It's a bit posh round here..."

When a visiting vicar says they are from a neighbouring parish that aspires to ours and I am thinking his so called poorer parish is out of reach for us to live in....

When a (mainly bussed in pupils) school play sneers at its local area, when the kids dad lives there, and it is a step up from where we live...

We came out as traditional working class in one survey, rely on both benefits (carers allowance) and family money ( both parents from council houses but got a house in suburbs) yet have some middle class values... It all gets a bit complicated. We are certainly looked down on by professionals for being single parent in poor area with DV in family, despite once being one of them. Life is not about fitting in a neat box . Disability fucks that up. DV also fucks it up. If not for those we would've been solidly middle class.

Jug of hottish tap water down toilet pan does the trick
.....only if it was mixed with napalm

We never refer to it but, if we had to, it would be a loo brush and certainly not a "toilet brush"...

Really brizzle 🙄

You're working class if you live somewhere that has a Community Centre.

golden

I dont think thats true

My word, this is all rather fascinating, what? I dare say I shouldn't like to speculate what class I may be as it could all get frightfully messy. I shall leave that to the butler to decide!

Hasn't this all rather changed somewhat - by which I mean social discussion and aspiration rather than actual reality of daily life - because these days it's far more of a badge of honour to be working class and has far less so to be bland/smug/bubble middle class? Added to which, what few of the "upper classes" remain are pretty much irrelevant in all spheres in 2018. Or maybe that's just in some areas and amongst celebs. Having spent some time in a particular part of Wiltshire recently, the people there all seemed to be - subtly of course - obsessed by social stratification. All said with a nudge and wink but they quite clearly did care about it.

littlemeitslynn it was tongue in cheek...of course, as presumably you knew.

Underclass- goes on Jeremy Kyle
Working Class - watches Jeremy Kyle
Middle Class - is horrified at the thought of Jeremy Kyle
Upper Class - never heard of Jeremy Kyle

This made me laugh, I quite happily admit to a sneaky watch occasionally of good 'ole Jezza but dh tuts and eye rolls at me if he catches me and tells me to turn it over or record it and watch it later if I must I suppose I shouldn't really admit to being quite partial to Judge Rinder too I'm imagining I should demote myself to underclass now?

Class is so weird. I was born and raised overseas but have lived in the UK for most of my adult life and feel British. My family background is very working class and my grandparents were poor, but their children (my parents, aunts and uncles) worked hard and were smart, and some of them are ‘professionals’, so doctors, teachers, etc. I am also a professional and have a ‘respectable’ career, mixing with mostly upper middle class people.

My husband’s family background is upper middle class and wealthy. But they are not well educated, not as well read or as cultured as my ‘working class’ family. In fact sometimes I cringe when I hear really ignorant opinions from his ‘upper middle class’ family.

My point (not very well made, I admit) is that the class definitions don’t really make sense these days. Your grandparents’ class doesn’t matter if you can’t hold your own in a social setting. Likewise, I couldn’t really describe myself as working class because I don’t fit that stereotype.

I think there will be a new loo brush thread on MN soon . .

Does it really matter though, this is just about being socialised to behave in a particular way, it benefits the owners of capital for you plebs to believe they are somehow superior, trustworthy - the rest of you are others. What benefit do those who profess to be upper class/middle class but poor feel they have over the working class poor? I can't help but feel the significance of the nonsense is to limit the life chances given to the lower classes?
Social mobility - where are you now?

Underclass- goes on Jeremy Kyle
Working Class - watches Jeremy Kyle
Middle Class - is horrified at the thought of Jeremy Kyle
Upper Class - never heard of Jeremy Kyle

I have to say, after a quick scan of the thread. This is brilliant and I may steal it for future use lol

Bourbon except it isn’t true and is just a shortcut to showing how snobby you are. I’m traditional working class and from a working class family and i’m horrified by Jeremy Kyle

What about the bookcase/tv comparison. If your bookshelf is wider than your tv you are middle class. If you are upper class then you have a library of old books no longer read

Harebellmeadow that’s often insulting too. It implies that working class people don’t like learning or reading. Neither is true without massive sweeping generalisations. Take for example my father who left school at 15 to work down a mine. He was still learning in his 60s. Attending night school and trying to upskill and keep up to date with changing regulations linked to his job as an electrician.

My father loved learning and millions of people who have attended courses through their Trades Unions or gone to night school or who take holiday from work to attend courses are testament to the fact that being working class doesn’t mean you are thick, uncapable of learning or unwilling to learn.

I spent this summer taking leave from work to attend a language course. I’m now using the free app to help me learn more. Thankfully I have more tools at my disposal because of technology but my class isn’t a barrier to learning even if my finances sometimes are.

There's also the 'underclass'. A term used to describe those who are not working.

Seems a bit derogatory really.

Sorry didnt want to offend. Hence the mention of classic books not read and therefore not being a reflection of the person themselves.

Social class in Britain is not complicated.

You are what your parents, usually your father, are or were. It often revolves around occupation and level of education required to achieve it. Earnings generally don't come not it. Education is the primary social class marker from type of school up..The upper class are the exception to the rule.

Son or daughter of a man with an inherited title, upper class.

Son daughter of a man in an old established profession e.g. medicine , law, city banking or high finance, upper level civil service, clergy etc = middle class

Son or daughter of, manual tradesman or lower e.g. plumber, bus driver etc, working class.

Both MC and WC have 'levels'. Upper MC = old money, trust funds, public school education, Oxbridge or similar , established professions etc Lower MC = lower level professions, most teachers, allied health and senior nurses, mid ranking civil servants etc. Upper WC = tradesmen, hairdressers, staff nurses/auxiliaries, etc. Lower WC = unskilled, minimum wage, transient work, welfare.