What social class am i? :/

[user1499695642]

This is something that really bothers me. I feel like i'm slipping and not following my parents' example.

I wish class didn't but I've been made to feel out of place before. What social class would you guys say I 'fit into'? I know it's shallow to ask, please don't judge me for asking. I'd just like to know what you guys think based on some info.

Age: 23
Ethnicity: Mixed race
Occupation: Graduate officer in local government
Salary: £20K
Live: With parents in (owned) 4 bed detached house in home counties (average price in village - £1.5m)
Parents: Civil Service Director/Housewife - just one went to (Russell Group) Uni
Education: Non-selective, comprehensive academy then Oxbridge (2.1 (2015))
Accent: More standard south-eastern than 'posh' (e.g. Joanna Lumley)
Hobbies: Museums, art galleries, theatre, TV
Social: I only made a couple friends at uni so my social group is very small. I only know 1 or 2 people in influential/ 'elite' professions

Am I middle class or does the following make me working class?:
Non-private/grammar education
Low salary/career sector
Non-house ownership
Social group
Accent

Does my parent's social class affect mine a lot or not so much?

Again, please don't judge me for asking. I'm genuinely just curious to know what others might think.

Why does it matter ?

I don't personally think it matters, but I do find it interesting.

Joanna Lumley is wonderful and very posh.

You must be posh yourself if you can't see that.

You are very middle class OP. Unless you hold your knife like a pen, in which case you will always be working class .

You work so you are working class. There is no such thing as middle class, the supposed middle class are aspirational working class. Simple as that.

Other countries think Brits are obsessed with class. They may be right to a degree, but I've often seen people saying that, for example, the USA does have different social classes, they just don't like to admit it.

I don't think it matters, at all and certainly wouldn't judge anyone on their background (as I hope they wouldn't judge me) . It's obviously more important what kind of person you are. It's just interesting to spot the class markers, but hopefully they are gradually disappearing.

You went to Oxford and have a professional job. Middle class. I am going to buy Watching the English now !

I'm not in the UK, but I think class is (almost) dead.
Isn't the future Queen of England a daughter of a woman who grew up in a council house or flat ?
I say class is almost dead because if it were a dead issue we wouldn't even know where her mother grew up.
Mind you Kate speaks posher than William.

OP, you are worrying about which class you fall into; ergo, you are MC (the UC and WC don't care).

"I feel like I'm slipping and not following my parents' example." You couldn't have written a more MC sentence!

I don't think the spectre of Carole Middleton behind a future queen suggests class is almost dead at all. Moneyed new money has very often married into the aristocracy (admittedly usually because the aristos in question needed a cash injunction via an American railway heiress like Consuelo Vanderbilt, or her imaginary cousin, Cora Grantham, who kept Downton Abbey afloat) without doing much to change the status quo. KM obviously didn't need to bankroll the royals, but I'm not sure much has changed. Especially as so much of the negative coverage of KM and her family has always been class-based -- all that 'Wisteria Sisters'/'doors to manual' stuff.

And there's an astonishing amount of forelock tugging on Mn, not just towards the royals, but at the idea that 'old money' is all lovely manners, battered tweeds and hail fellow well met to all walks of life, while new money is viewed as grabby, materialistic, shrill and bad taste.

I think class is alive and well, and perpetuated by the education system.

In my experience once someone starts spending time wondering what class they are then they're middle class.

I'm middle class but I can't imagine my working class brother has spent more than an instant wondering what class he is.

(I typed this just before seeing senua had got there before me.)

Middle class.

Today 10:06 hollyisalovelyname

I'm not in the UK, but I think class is (almost) dead.
Isn't the future Queen of England a daughter of a woman who grew up in a council house or flat ?
I say class is almost dead because if it were a dead issue we wouldn't even know where her mother grew up. smile
Mind you Kate speaks posher than William.

Where to start...???! Lol

I'm middle class but I can't imagine my working class brother has spent more than an instant wondering what class he is

By what mechanisms have you and your brother parted ways in class terms, nauticant? Assuming you have the same parents and roughly similar upbringing, obviously.

If you're not sure, you're middle class

The working and upper classes know exactly what they are.

Joanna Lumley is so amazing. Just throwing that in.

It's totally irrelevant and also a bit offensive.

You're implying that there would be something wrong with being working class?

That somehow being working class is 'less than' or 'below' middle class?

Is that genuinely what you think?

Those expressing surprise that the OP cares, or claiming that class is irrelevant in 2017 are being disingenuous. Maybe class should be irrelevant, but it isn't. People judge each other on these kinds of class markers all the time. I'd say you were middle-middle or maybe lower middle, OP.

Fish knives are not a signal.

Do they though?

I'm working class....dad was an alcoholic, DM dropped out of college to have me at 17. I was brought up in a terraced house in Stoke. I call my evening meal 'tea'. My GPs worked down the pits and in factories (including the women).

I also earn six figures, live in the Home Counties, have a law degree from an RG uni, eat quinoa and drink champagne when I'm not pregnant

I could arguably be working class or upper middle class, surely that in itself is an argument to say that class is in its death throes.

I've never found that being from a working class has held me back. In fact it's meant I've been able to connect with people from all kinds of backgrounds which gives me an advantage in some respects.

...and not make snobby assumptions about people from the working class

Interesting how the definition and split changes with time https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SocialclasssintheeUnited_Kingdom
Apparently there are 7 social classes so it's a bit more of a spread

Please not another cringey class thread.

I would say OP, do not concern yourself with such things. The only people who care are not ones you want to trouble yourself with.

Speak how you do, eat the food you enjoy, immerse yourself in culture that nourishes you and do a job that brings satisfaction (or suits your needs).

And if other people find that cause to judge, that is entirely their problem.

Class is an English obsession I think. Being Scottish and living in England I firmly believe you can only be posh if you are English. It's just not possible to be a posh Scottish person, or Welsh say or Australian. You can be as rich as the Queen but just not posh.

So, how long are your parents occupation and background/ money relevant?
I do, as does my DH ,a very ordinary manual/ shop work type job.
Our parents couldn't have been more different.
Now what?