University of Bielefeld Faculty of Linguistics and Literary Studies Summer Term 2004 Course: Introduction to British Civilization Lecturer: Dr. M. Pätzold Class Group Project by Ansujore Johanna Bunte Susanne Flötotto Rebecca Straßenburg Anna Wenzel
Brief Abstract Social Class, as the main form of social stratifications in British society, is a key factor for wealth, political power, educational opportunity, and a person s style of life. Although the differences between classes are not clearly marked and classes merge into one another, one can mainly distinguish three major forms: the upper-class, which contains the aristocracy as well as the upper-middle class, the middle class, which can further be subdivided into higherand lower-middle class, and the working class, i.e. the new and the traditional working class. The development of different classes dates back to the Industrial Revolution, which proceeded in different speeds within different parts of the country. Moreover, classes are strongly shaped by the Second World War, which changed the job-situation to a great extend, and thus, improved the conditions of the working class. Furthermore, political events, traditions, national characteristics, and the upheavals of war have affected the forms of class after 1945.
Summary There are all in all three elements which make up classes: first, they are shaped by history. They originate in the Industrial Revolution and after 1945, political events, traditions, national characteristics and the upheavals of war have affected the system of classes in Great Britain. Secondly, there is a subjective element, i.e. it depends on the status of people how they define class forms. Thirdly, class exists because of the various areas of inequality in modern society, which are power, authority, income and job situation. It is not clear whether there has been an upper class in Britain after 1945, since many people from the former upper classes joined the aristocracy and there was just a fine distinction between the terms aristocrats and upper-middle class, which is the reason why people from lower status could not make out a difference at all. During the 19 th century, the upper class elaborated on older traditions in evolving a distinctive ethos. There was a box of attitudes and life styles which could be adopted by newcomers from other classes. In those days, the upper class dominated the spheres of power, authority, wealth, and income totally disproportionate to their numbers. Its members had a distinctive culture and a life-style of their own. Whereas the upper class only made up about 2% in the years after 1945, 60% of the population belonged to the working class and 30% to the middle class. There was an important line between upper-middle class, e.g. local businessman and more prestigious professionals, and lower middle class, i.e. clericals and other white collar workers. The disruptions of war caused a change in the status and bargaining of power of the working class: they were able to exploit the very high demand of labour engendered by the necessities of war. As the Labour Government favoured the working-class, and thus, brought a substantial progress in working-class conditions, the middle- and upper-class were concerned about the high taxation. After 1951, when the Conservatives were back in power, higher civil services were still dominated by upper class members. In the mid fifties, journalism, publishing, films, radio, television and advertising were classic retreats for the upper-class. Significant barriers existed between aristocracy and upper-middle class on the one hand and between the middle class and the rest on the other hand. Some reasons people mentioned for belonging to the upper-middle class are financial, genealogical, occupation and educational, sartorial, cultural and conventional. The middle class, whose members in comparison to the working class people mostly received secondary education, recruited from all branches of society. In the late 19 th and early 20 th century, people distinguished between the respectable and the rough working-class, whereas in post-war Britain the working class appeared quite homogenous and self confident and there was little aspiration to middle class values. Despite all these improvements, working-class members still had to perform manual work under arduous, uncongenial and plain boring circumstances. The working conditions required special working clothes and many of these people wore physical marks, which is the reason why most of the working people were discouraged of educational aspiration. Though class is an important key factor for wealth, political power, educational opportunity, and style of life it is a difficult subject, since there is a great amount of non-traditionalists views next to the traditional three-tier class-structure.
Questions 1. Which elements can make up different classes? 2. Which different classes exist in British society? 3. What are the reasons for belonging to the upper-class? 4. How many percent of the British population belonged to the middle class after 1945? 5. What happened to the working class after the Second World War? 6. What are the subjective elements which make it difficult to define classes? 7. What was the origin of class-forming processes? 8. Which branches do the aristocratic people work in? 9. What is meant by power to paralyse? 10. Is there still a social stratification in present British culture? 11. What can you say about social stratification in Germany?
Exercises Find the appropriate words that fit into the gaps! The list below will help you. 1. Probably there would be about as much agreement that Britain in the late forties and early fifties could be divided up into a number of, though there would also be much about how and where lines should be drawn. 2. It was still possible, of course, to make a fine between on one side, and the on the other. 3. When it is a question of fine distinctions, as opposed to the broad historically significant categories, we find that much depends on the class position of the. 4. and there was a very deep vein of making for the continued elaboration of a distinction between those truly aristocratic and those who, for lack of a better phrase, must be distinguished as. 5. Finally, there was the problem of that wretched foreign word, often translated into English as middle class. 6. The growth of a large-scale industrial organization and the so-called has, it was argued, replaced old-style capitalists with salaried managers. 7. A quick survey of the sources shows that many within the upper-class fold were able to lead a life of considerable amplitude in the age of. 8. A prosperous housewife gave her reasons for allocating herself and her husband to the Upper-Middle Class`. These were -her husband earned a good income and they now lived on the interest from investments; -their fathers were respectively architect and headmaster; and -her husband was an MA of Cambridge and had been Director of Agricultural Research in the Sudan; -they enjoyed good music, books, plays, etc. Words: Cultural, social classes, disagreement, distinction, aristocrats, upper-middle class, Occupational, individual observer, Financial, snobbishness, upper-middle class, bourgeois, Genealogical, managerial revolution, austerity, Educational
The British Obsession with Class This article is reproduced by kind permission of 'The Week' and first appeared there on June 17, 2000 George Orwell called us "the most class-ridden society under the sun", and in their recent attacks on "elitism" it would seem Gordon Brown and John Prescott agree with him. Are they right? Isn't the class war a thing of the past? Margaret Thatcher dismissed class as a communist idea, John Major spoke of creating a classless society and Tony Blair talks of "inclusion". But none of this has changed public attitudes - the British are ever more convinced that class is a barrier to advancement. For 40 years Gallup surveys have been asking the question: is the class war now irrelevant? In the Sixties 60% disagreed; in the Nineties that figure was up to 80%. According to a recent Mori Poll, four out of five people think there are too many barriers based on class distinctions while a large majority reject the notion that it is easy to move from one class to another. Are they right? Comparatively speaking, no. The evidence suggests there is at least as much social mobility in Britain as in other countries. Indeed, the conclusion of one of the major surveys on mobility, carried out by the social scientist John Goldthorpe in the Seventies, was that Britain is surprisingly open society. For example, more than a quarter of the managers and professionals surveyed (social class 1) had fathers who were manual working class, a higher proportion than those whose fathers were professionals. A study in 1996, tracing the lives of children born in 1958, found that more than 50% had moved class: of those in the lowest class (semi-skilled and unskilled manual workers), half had moved into the "intermediate" class and a quarter into the professional class. But didn't we use to be a very rigid society? On the contrary, the bright and able have historically found it easier to succeed here than elsewhere. Serfdom and restrictions imposed by medieval guilds and centralising monarchies disappeared in Britain long before they did in continental Europe. Playwrights from Ben Johnson onwards wrote comedies of social climbing and slippage, many of which would never have been allowed on the Continent. In France Beaumarchais's play The Marriage or Figaro, written in 1784, was blocked by censors because it seemed to suggest that a valet could hope to be on a par with his master. As David Landes argues in his recent book, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations, the very fluidity of British society helps explain why the Industrial Revolution happened here first.
So why are the British still so obsessed with class? According to David Cannadine, author of Class in Britain, it is because unlike other countries Britain never experienced a revolutionary assault on traditional notions of hierarchy. In 18th century America, the Founding Fathers consciously rejected the idea of hierarchy by declaring titles illegal: this didn't, of course, abolish inequality but it did diminish the use of class as a social description. Something similar was achieved in Europe through bloody revolution and social upheaval. But since the 18th century, no social group in Britain has had their privileges forcefully overturned. So although society has been transformed, the way we look at it has not. Hence the iconography and trappings of class in Britain remain and popular drama, from Brideshead Revisited to Brookside, continues to reinforce class stereotypes. So is "class" just a matter of perception? No. There does appear to be a group at the bottom of society - the underclass - from which few manage to escape from one generation to the next. Around a quarter of all children growing up in the late Nineties came from families in which no adult is in employment. Under global capitalism the gap between the richest and the poorest is getting wider. Such trends, however, are not peculiar to Britain - in America the disparities are even wider. But whereas we tend to interpret them as evidence of a widening class divide, Americans do not. In a recent US poll 80% said they did not resent the rich and 79% agreed that "people who work hard are likely to succeed". And do such perceptions alter the reality? In many ways, yes. Lacking a perception of class, Americans divide their society along rigid ethnic lines. This, as Paul Barker argues in The Independent on Sunday, is in many ways more destructive, since you cannot change your race. On the other hand, the British obsession with class tends to reinforce low expectations. For example, university graduates who went to state schools tend to be less ambitious than their privately-educated peers, according to a survey by High Fliers Research. While the latter group tends to choose the most competitive, highly paid careers - such as law, investment banking and the media - those from state schools plump for steadier, more middle-of-the road jobs. Of those who hope to work in the public sector, 71 % attended state school. Only a quarter of those who want to go into teaching come from private schools. So is our education system at the root of the problem? In many ways yes, but not, as Gordon Brown suggested, because Oxford dons discriminate against state-school pupils. The real issue lies in the gap between Britain' private schools, regarded as the best in the world, and state schools, where educational achievement - based on the proportion of A to C grades at GCSE or its equivalent - stands at about half the level of Germany or France. The most significant change came with the abolition of the most grammar and direct grant schools in the late Sixties. In 1969 two thirds of those admitted to Oxbridge came from state schools. Now it is barely more than 50%. http://elt.britcoun.org.pl/v_brclass.htm 07.05.04