Excerpts
from
"Class",
by
Ballantine Books,
New York,
1983
Although
most Americans
sense
that they live
within
an
extremely complicated
system
of social classes
and
suspect
that much
of
what is thought
and
done here
is prompted
by
considerations
of status,
the subject
has
remained murky.
And
always
touchy.
You can
outrage people
today
simply
by mentioning
social class,
very much
the way,
sipping tea
among the aspidistras
a century ago,
you could
silence a party
by adverting
too openly
to sex.
When, recently,
asked what I am writing,
I have answered,
"A book about
social class in America,"
people tend
first
to straighten their ties
and
sneak a glance
at their cuffs
to
see how far
fraying
has advanced there.
Then,
a few minutes later,
they silently get up
and walk away.
It is not just that
I am feared
as a class spy.
It is as if
I had said,
"I am working
on a book
urging
the beating to death
of baby whales
using
the dead bodies
of baby seals,"
Since I have been
writing this book
I have experienced
many times
the awful truth
of
R. H. Tawney's
perception,
in his book
Equality
(1931):
"The word
'class'
is fraught
with
unpleasing associations,
so that
to linger upon it
is apt
to be interpreted
as the symptom
of a perverted mind
and
a jaundiced spirit."
Especially in America,
where the idea of class
is notably embarrassing.
In his book
Inequality
in an Age
of Decline
(1980)
the sociologist
Paul Blumberg
goes so far
as to call it
"America's
forbidden thought."
Indeed,
people often
blow their tops
if the subject
is even broached.
One woman,
asked
by a couple
of interviewers
if she
thought there were
social classes
in this country,
answered:
"It's the dirtiest thing
I've ever heard of!"
And a man,
asked
the same question,
got
so angry
that he blurted out,
"Social class
should be
exterminated!"
Actually,
you
reveal
a great deal
about
your social class
by
the amount
of annoyance
or
fury
you feel
when the subject
is brought up.
A tendency
to get very anxious
suggests
that you
are middle-class
and
nervous
about slipping down
a rung or two.
On the other hand,
upper-class people
love the topic
to come up;
the more attention
paid to the matter
the better off
they seem to be.
Proletarians
generally don't mind
discussions
of the subject
because
they know
they can do little
to
alter
their class identity.
Thus the whole
class matter
is likely to seem
like a joke to them --
the upper classes
fatuous
in their
empty
aristocratic
pretentiousness,
the middles
loathsome
in their anxious gentility.
It is
the middle class
that is
highly class-sensitive,
and
sometimes
class-scared to death.
[...]
If you reveal
your class
by your outrage
at the very topic,
you reveal it also
by
the way
you define the thing
that's outraging you.
At the bottom,
people
tend to believe
that class
is defined by
the amount
of money
you have.
In the middle,
people grant
that
money
has something
to do with it,
but think
education
and
the kind of work
you do
almost
equally important.
Nearer the top,
people perceive
that
taste,
values,
ideas,
style,
and
behavior
are
indispensable criteria
of class,
regardless
of money
or occupation
or education.
[...]
Being told
that there are
no social classes
in the place
where
the interviewee lives
is
an old experience
for sociologists.
"'We don't have
classes
in our town'
almost invariably
is the first remark
recorded
by
the investigator,"
reports
Leonard Reissman,
author of
Class in American Life
(1959).
[...]
So powerful
is
"the fable
of equality,"
as Frances Trollope
called it
when she
toured America
in 1832,
so embarrassed
is the government
to confront
the subject --
in the thousands
of measurements
pouring from
its bureaus,
social class
is
not
officially recognized --
that
it is easy
for visitors
not to notice
the way
the class system works.
[...]
Like
the carpenter
who says:
"I hate to say there are
classes,
but
it's just that
people
are
more comfortable
with people
of
like backgrounds."
His grouping of people
by
"like backgrounds",
scientifically
uncertain as it may be,
is nearly
as good a way as any
to specify
what it is
that distinguishes
one class
from another.
If you
feel no need
to explicate your allusions
or
in any way
explain
what
you
mean,
you are probably talking
to someone in your class.
[...]
In this book
I am going to deal with
some of
the visible
and audible signs
of social class,
but I will be
sticking largely
with those
that reflect
choice.
That means
that I will not be
considering
matters of race,
or,
except now and then,
religion
or politics.
Race is
visible,
but it is not
chosen.
Religion
and politics,
while usually
chosen,
don't show,
except for
the occasional
front-yard shrine
or
car bumper sticker.
When you
look at a person
you don't see
"Roman Catholic"
or
"liberal":
you see
"hand-painted necktie"
or
"crappy polyester shirt";
you hear
parameters
or
in regards to.
In attempting
to make sense
of indicators
like these,
I have been
guided
by perception and feel
rather than
by any method
that could be
deemed "scientific",
believing
with Arthur Marwick,
author of
Class: Image and Reality (1980),
that
"class ...
is too serious a subject
to leave
to the social scientists."
It should be
a serious subject
in America especially,
because here
we lack
a convenient system
of inherited
titles,
ranks,
and honors,
and each generation
has to
define the hierarchies
all over again.
The society
changes faster
than
any other on earth,
and the American,
almost uniquely,
can be puzzled
about
where,
in the society,
he stands.
[...]
John Adams,
[...]
says,
as early as 1805:
"The rewards ...
in this life
are
esteem
and
admiration of others --
the punishments
are
neglect
and
contempt ...
The desire of
the esteem of others
is as real
a want
of nature
as hunger --
and
the neglect
and
contempt of the world
as severe a pain
as
the gout
or stone..."
About
the same time
the Irish poet
Thomas Moore,
sensing
the special predicament
Americans
were inviting
with their
egalitarian Constitution,
described
the citizens
of Washington, D.C.,
as creatures
"Born
to be slaves,
and
struggling
to be lords".
Thirty years later,
in
Democracy in America,
Alexis de Tocqueville
put his finger
precisely
on the special problems
of class
aspiration
here.
"Nowhere,"
he wrote,
"do citizens appear
so insignificant
as
in
a democratic nation."
Nowhere,
consequently,
is there
more strenuous
effort to achieve --
earn
would probably
not be
the right word --
significance.
[...]
That is,
where everybody
is somebody,
nobody
is anybody.
[...]
Because
the myth
conveys
the impression
that you
can readily
earn your way
upward,
disillusion
and bitterness
are particularly strong
when
you find yourself
trapped
in a class system
you've been
half persuaded
isn't
important.
When
in
early middle life
some people
discover
that
certain limits
have been placed
on
their capacity
to ascend socially
by such
apparent irrelevancies
as
heredity,
early environment,
and
the social class
of their immediate forebears,
they go
into something
like despair,
which,
if generally secret,
is no less destructive.
[...]
The force
of sheer
class envy
behind vile
and
even criminal behavior
in this country,
the result
in part
of disillusion
over
the official myth
of classlessness,
should never be
underestimated.
[...]
Despite
our
public embrace
of
political
and
judicial
equality,
in individual perception
and
understanding --
much of which
we refrain
from publicizing --
we
arrange things
vertically
and
insist
on
crucial differences
in
value.
Regardless
of what we say
about
equality,
I think everyone
at some point
comes to feel
like
the Oscar Wilde
who said,
"The brotherhood
of man
is not
a mere
poet's dream:
it is
a most depressing
and
humiliating
reality."
It's as if
in our heart of hearts
we don't want
agglomerations
but
distinctions.
Analysis
and
separation
we find
interesting,
synthesis
boring.
[...]
Those who sell
"executive desks"
and
related office furniture
know
that they
and
their clients
agree
on
a rigid "class" hierarchy.
Desks
made of oak
are
at the bottom,
and those
of walnut
are
next.
Then,
moving up,
mahogany
is, if you like,
"upper-middle class,"
until we arrive,
finally,
at
the apex: teak.
In the army,
at ladies'
social functions,
pouring the coffee
is the prerogative
of the
senior officer's wife
because,
as the ladies
all know,
coffee
outranks
tea.
There seems
no place
where
hierarchical
status-orderings
aren't discoverable.
Take
musical
instruments.
[...]
... to hear
"My boy's
taking lessons
on
the viola da gamba"
is
to receive
a powerful
signal of class,
the kind attaching
to
antiquarianism
and
museum,
gallery,
or
"educational" work.
Guitars
(except
when played
in "classical" --
that is,
archaic -- style)
are low
by nature,
and
that is why
they were
so often employed
as
tools
of intentional
class degradation
by
young people
in
the 1960s and '70s.
The guitar
was
the perfect instrument
for the purpose
of signaling
these
young people's flight
from
the
upper-middle
and
middle classes,
associated
as it is
with
Gypsies,
cowhands,
and
other personnel
without
inherited
or
often
even earned
money
and
without
fixed residence.
[...]
Nobody
knows for sure
what the word
CLASS
means.
[...]
I do wish
the word caste
were domesticated
in the United States,
because
it nicely conveys
the actual rigidity
of
class lines here,
the difficulty
of moving --
either upward
or downward --
out of the place
where
you were nurtured.
How many
classes
are there?
The simplest answer
is that
there are
only two,
the rich
and
the poor,
employer
and
employed,
landlord
and
tenant,
bourgeois
and
proletariat.
[...]
Paul Blumberg
notes
"a fundamental
class cleavage"
today
between
people
who can afford
to buy a house --
any house --
and
people
who can't,
a fairly elevated
version
of
the distinction
down below
between
those who
own cars
and
those who
must depend
on
public transportation
and
who thus
spend a great deal
of their time
waiting around
for the bus
to show up.
[...]
In
The
Working-Class
Majority (1974),
Andrew Levinson says,
"All the clichés
and
pleasant notions
of
how the old
class divisions ...
have disappeared
are exposed
as hollow phrases
by the simple fact
that
American workers
must accept
serious injury
and
even death
as
part of
their daily
reality
while
the middle class
does not."
And he goes on:
"Imagine ...
the universal outcry
that would occur
if every year
several
corporate headquarters
routinely collapsed
like mines,
crushing
sixty or seventy
executives.
Or suppose
that all the banks
were filled
with an invisible
noxious dust
that constantly
produced cancer
in the
managers,
clerks,
and tellers.
Finally,
try to imagine
the horror ...
if thousands
of university professors
were
deafened every year
or
lost fingers,
hands,
sometimes eyes,
while
on their jobs."
And speaking
of death and injury,
probably
the most awful
class division
in
America,
one that cuts deeply
across the center
of society
and
that will poison
life here
for generations,
is
the one separating
those
whose
young people
were killed
or savaged
in
the Vietnam War
and
those who,
thanks largely
to
the infamous S-2 deferment
for
college students,
escaped.
Anyone uncertain
about
class consciousness
in this country
should listen
to
a working-class father
whose son
was killed:
"I'm bitter.
You
bet
your goddam dollar
I'm bitter.
It's people
like us
who give up
our sons
for
the country.
The business people,
they
run the country
and
make money from it.
The college types,
the professors,
they go
to Washington
and
tell the government
what to do...
But
their sons,
they
don't end up
in
the swamps
over there,
in
Vietnam.
No, sir."
And
a mother
adds:
"We
can't understand
how all those
rich kids --
the kids
with beads
from
the suburbs --
how
they get off
when
my son
had to go."
[...]
In Britain
three
has been
popularly accepted
as
the number of classes
at least
since
the last century,
when
Matthew Arnold
divided
his neighbors
and friends
into
upper,
middle,
and
lower classes,
or
as he
memorably
termed them,
Barbarians
(at the top, notice),
Philistines
(in the middle),
and
Populace.
This
three-tiered
conception
is
the usual way
to think
of
the class system
for people
in the middle,
for
it offers them
moral
and
social
safety,
positioning them
equally distant
from
the vices
of
pride
and
snobbery
and
waste
and
carelessness,
which they associate
with those
above them,
and
dirtiness,
constraint,
and shame,
the attendants
of
those below.
[...]
My researches
have persuaded me
that
there are nine classes
in this country,
as follows:
Top out-of-sight
Upper
Upper middle
--------
Middle
High proletarian
Mid-proletarian
Low proletarian
--------
Destitute
Bottom out-of-sight
[...]
"Economically,
no doubt,
there are
only two classes,
the rich
and
the poor,"
says George Orwell,
"But socially
there is
a whole hierarchy
of classes,
and
the manners
and traditions
learned by each class
in childhood
are not only
very different
but --
this is
the essential point --
generally
persist
from birth to death ...
It is ...
culturally,
from
the class
into which
you
have been born."
When
John Fitzgerald Kennedy,
watching
Richard Nixon
on television,
turned
to his friends
and, horror-struck,
said,
"The guy
has
no class,"
he
was not talking
about money.
[...]
And down
below,
the principle
still holds:
money
doesn't matter
that much.
To illustrate
the point,
John Brooks
compares
two families
living
in adjoining houses
in a suburb.
One man
is "blue-collar",
a
garage mechanic.
The other
is "white-collar",
an employee
in
a publishing house.
They make
roughly
the same amount
of money,
but
what a difference.
"Mr. Blue"
bought
a small neat
"ranch house".
"Mr. White"
bought
a beat-up
old house
and
refurbished it
himself.
Mrs. Blue
uses the local shops,
especially those
in the nearby
shopping center,
and thinks them
wonderful,
"so convenient."
Mrs. White
goes
to the city
to
buy her clothes.
The Blues
drink,
but rather
furtively,
and
usually
on Saturday night
with
the curtains closed.
The Whites
drink
openly,
often
right out
in the backyard.
"The Blues
shout
to each other,
from
room to room
of their house
or
from
corner to corner
on their lot,
without
self-consciousness;
the Whites
modulate
their voices
to the point
where
they sometimes
can't hear
each other."
As
household objects,
books
are
a crucial criterion.
There's
not
a book
in the Blues' house,
while
the Whites'
living room
contains
numerous
full bookshelves.
Brooks
concludes:
"Here,
in sum,
are two families
with
hardly anything
in common ...,
yet
their ...
incomes
are
practically identical."
Likewise,
it was
Russell Lyne's
awareness
that
it's less money
than
taste
and
knowledge
and
perceptiveness
that
determine class
that
some years ago
prompted him
to set forth
the tripartite scheme
of
highbrow,
middlebrow,
and
lowbrow.
Not that
the three classes
at the top
don't have money.
The point is
that
money alone
doesn't
define them,
for the way
they have
their money
is largely
what matters.
That is,
as a class indicator
the amount
of
money
is less significant
than
the source.
The main thing
distinguishing
the top three classes
from each other
is the amount of money
inherited
in relation to
the amount
currently earned.
The
top-out-of-sight
class
(Rockefellers,
Pews,
DuPonts,
Mellons,
Fords,
Vanderbilts)
lives
on inherited capital
entirely.
No one
whose money,
no matter
how copious,
comes from
his own work --
film stars
are an example --
can be
a member
of the
top-out-of-sight class,
even if
the size
of
his income
and
the extravagance
of
his expenditure
permit him
to
simulate identity
with it.
Inheritance --
"old money"
in
the vulgar phrase --
is
the indispensable
principle
defining
the top
three classes,
and
it's best
if the money's
been
in the family
for
three
or
four generations.
[...]
It was
the
Great Depression,
Vance Packard
speculates,
that
badly frightened
the
very rich,
teaching them
to
be "discreet,
almost reticent,
in
exhibiting
their wealth."
[...]
The situation now
is very different
from
the one in the 1890s
satirized
by Thorstein Veblen
in The Theory
of the Leisure Class.
In his day the rich
delighted
to exhibit themselves
conspicuously,
with
costly retainers
and
attendants
much in evidence.
Now
they hide,
not merely
from
envy
and
revenge
but from
expose journalism
much advanced
in
cunning and ferocity
since
Veblen's time,
and
from an even worse
threat,
virtually
unknown to Veblen,
foundation mendicancy,
with
its hordes
of beggars
in three-piece suits
constantly
badgering
the well-to-do.
Showing off
used to be
the main satisfaction
of being
very rich
in America.
Now
the rich
must skulk
and hide.
It's a pity.
And it's not just that
the individual houses
and
often the persons
of the top-out-of-sights
are
removed from scrutiny.
Their very class
tends to escape
the down-to-earth
calculations
of sociologists
and poll-takers
and consumer researchers.
It's not studied
because
it's literally
out of sight,
and
a questionnaire proffered
to
a top-out-of-sight person
will very likely
be
hurled to the floor
with disdain.
Very much,
in fact,
the way it would be
ignored
by
a bottom-out-of-sight
person.
And it's here
that we begin
to perceive
one of
the
most wonderful things
about
the
American class system --
the curious
similarity,
if not actual
brotherhood,
of the top-
and
bottom-out-of-sights.
Just as the tops
are hidden away
on their islands
or behind
the peek-a-boo walls
of their distant estates,
the bottoms
are equally invisible,
when
not put away
in institutions
or
claustrated in monasteries,
lamaseries,
or
communes,
then
hiding
from creditors,
deceived
bail-bondsmen,
and
gulled merchants
intent
on repossessing cars
and furniture.
[...]
In aid
of invisibility,
members
of both classes
feel
an equal anxiety
to keep
their names
out of the papers.
And
the bottoms --
"the lower
or
spurious
leisure class,"
Veblen calls them --
share
something more
with
the top-out-of-sights.
They do not
earn
their money.
They are
given it
and
kept afloat
not by
their own efforts
or merits
but by
the welfare machinery
or
the correctional system,
the
way the tops
owe it all
to their ancestors.
And
a further similarity:
members
of both classes
carry
very little cash
on their persons.
We can say,
in summary,
that
the virtual identity,
in important respects,
of top-
and bottom-
out-of-sights
is
a remarkable example
of
the time-proven principle
that Extremes Meet.
The next class
down,
the upper class,
differs from
the top-out-of-sight class
in
two main ways.
First,
although
it inherits
a lot
of its money,
it earns quite a bit
too,
usually from
some attractive,
if slight, work,
without which
it would
feel bored
and
even ashamed.
It's likely
to make its money
by controlling banks
and
the more historic
corporations,
think tanks,
and foundations,
and
to busy itself
with things
like
the older universities,
the Council on Foreign Relations,
the Foreign Policy Association,
the Committee for
Economic Development,
and the like,
together
with
the executive branch
of the federal government,
and
often the Senate.
In the days
when ambassadors
were amateurs,
they were selected
largely
from this class,
very seldom
from
the top-out-of-sight.
And secondly,
unlike
the top-out-of-sights,
the upper class
is visible,
often ostentatiously so.
Which is to say
that
the top-out-of-sights
have
spun off and away
from
Veblen's scheme
of conspicuous exhibition,
leaving
the mere upper class
to carry on
its former role.
When you
pass a house
with
a would-be
impressive facade
visible
from the street
or highway,
you know
it's occupied
by a member
of the upper class.
The White House
is probably
the best example.
Its residents,
even on
those occasions
when they are
Franklin D. Roosevelts
or even
John F. Kennedys,
can never be
designated
top-out-of-sight
but only
The house
is simply
too showy,
being
pure white
and
carefully positioned
on high ground,
and
temporary residence
there
usually constitutes
a come-down
for most
of its occupants.
It is
a hopelessly
upper-class place --
or
even lower
than that,
as when
the Harry Trumans
lived there.
[...]
[All items above
were drawn from
pages 1 - 22
of the book "Class"]
+++
Whether you
learn to read
at
a good
or
bad college
or at
a good
or
bad prep school
or
high school,
what
you read
is an
almost infallible
class signal.
(And
whether
you read
at all.
"The divisions
between
those
who read and write
and
those who don't,"
says Tom Wolfe,
"are
taking on
a great
social significance.")
The taste
in reading
of the upper classes
is
soon dispatched.
C. Wright Mills
is correct
when
he observes
that although
they may
display books,
they tend
not to read them
except
books
on "management"
and
copious
mystery
and detective
narratives,
forgotten
as soon
as consumed.
They read
magazines mostly,
precisely those
John T. Molloy
recommends
disposing
about
the office waiting room
to convey
an upper-middle-class
air:
Time,
Newsweek,
and
U. S. News & World Report;
and
Fortune,
Forbes,
Business Week,
Barron's,
and
Dun's Review.
If you're
an author
and you give
one
of your books
to a member
of
the upper class,
you must never
expect him
to read it.
[...]
[drawn
from page 163]
+++
Some of these
class dividers
are crude.
Others
are subtle.
The upper
and upper-middle classes
have
a special vocabulary
for indicating
wearisome
or
unhappy
social situations.
They say
iresome
or
tedious
where
their social inferiors
would say
boring;
they say
upset
or
distressed
or even
cross
where others
would say
angry
or
mad
or
sore.
There's
a special
upper-class diction
of
approval too.
No prole man
would
call something
super (Anglophilic)
or
outstanding (prep school),
just as
it would sound
like flagrant affectation
for
a prole woman
to
designate something
seen
in a store
as divine
or darling
or adorable.
Nice
would be
the
non-upper way
of putting it.
But
it's the middle-class
quest
for grandeur
and gentility
that produces
the
most interesting effects.
As we've seen,
imported words
especially
are its downfall.
It will speak of
a graffiti
and it thinks
chauvinism
has something to do
with
gender aggression.
Pseudo-classical
plurals
are
a constant pitfall:
the middles
will speak learnedly
of
a phenomena
and a
criteria
and
a strata
and
(referring
perhaps
to a newspaper)
a media.
A well-known
author
is
a literati.
It thinks
context
a grander form
of the word
content,
and
thus says things
like
"I didn't like
the context
of that book:
all that
blood and gore."
Or
consider
the official
Coast Guard officer
reporting
a grievous oil spill
in San Francisco Bay:
cross
is too vulgar
a term
for the occasion,
he imagines,
and so
he says that
"several ships
transited
the area."
When
after
a succession
of solecisms
of this kind
a middle-class
person
will begin
to suspect
that
he is
blowing his cover,
he may try
to
reestablish status
by appliqueing
a mock-classical
plural ending
onto
a perfectly
ordinary word
like process.
Then
he
will say
process-sees.
The whole
middle-class
performance
nicely illustrates
the conclusion
of Lord Melbourne.
"The higher
and
lower classes,
there's
some good
in them,"
he observed,
"But
the middle classes
are all
affectation
and
conceit
and
pretense
and
concealment."
[...]
[drawn from page 180]
+++
The X
Way Out
"X" people
are better
conceived
as
belonging to
a category
than
a class
because
you are not
born
an X person,
as you are
born
and
reared
a prole
or a middle.
You
become
an X person,
or
to put it
more bluntly,
you earn
X-personhood
by
a strenuous effort
of discovery
in which
curiosity
and
originality
are indispensible.
And
in discovering
that
you can become
an X person
you find
the
only escape
from class.
Entering
category X
often requires
flight
from
parents
and
forebears.
The young
flocking
to the cities
to
devote themselves
to
"art",
"writing",
"creative work" --
anything,
virtually,
that
liberates them
from
the presence
of a boss
or supervisor --
are
aspirant X people,
and
if they succeed
in capitalizing
on
their talents,
they
may end
as fully fledged
X types.
What kind
of people
are Xs?
The old-fashioned
term
bohemians
gives
some idea;
so does
the term
the talented.
Some Xs
are
intellectuals,
but
a lot are not:
they are
actors,
musicians,
artists,
sports stars,
"celebrities",
well-to-do
former hippies,
confirmed
residers abroad,
and
the more gifted
journalists,
those
whose by-lines
intelligent readers
recognize
with
pleasant anticipation.
X people
can be described
as
(to use
C. Wright Mills's
term)
"self-cultivated".
They
tend to be
self-employed,
doing what
social scientists
call
autonomous work.
If,
as Mills has said,
the
middle-class person
is
"always
somebody's man,"
the X person
is
nobody's,
and
his freedom
from supervision
is one
of
his most obvious
characteristics.
X people
are
independent-minded,
free
of anxious regard
for
popular shibboleths,
loose in carriage
and
demeanor.
They adore
the work they do,
and
they do it
until they are
finally
carried out,
"retirement"
being
a concept
meaningful only
to
hired personnel
or
wage slaves
who
despise their work.
having
much
of the freedom
and
some of the power
of
a top-out-of-sight
or
upper-class person,
but
without the money.
X category
is a sort of
unmonied
aristocracy.
[...]
[drawn from pages 212 - 213]
+++
from
"Class",
by
Paul Fussell,
Ballantine Books,
New York,
1983
Although
most Americans
sense
that they live
within
an
extremely complicated
system
of social classes
and
suspect
that much
of
what is thought
and
done here
is prompted
by
considerations
of status,
the subject
has
remained murky.
And
always
touchy.
You can
outrage people
today
simply
by mentioning
social class,
very much
the way,
sipping tea
among the aspidistras
a century ago,
you could
silence a party
by adverting
too openly
to sex.
When, recently,
asked what I am writing,
I have answered,
"A book about
social class in America,"
people tend
first
to straighten their ties
and
sneak a glance
at their cuffs
to
see how far
fraying
has advanced there.
Then,
a few minutes later,
they silently get up
and walk away.
It is not just that
I am feared
as a class spy.
It is as if
I had said,
"I am working
on a book
urging
the beating to death
of baby whales
using
the dead bodies
of baby seals,"
Since I have been
writing this book
I have experienced
many times
the awful truth
of
R. H. Tawney's
perception,
in his book
Equality
(1931):
"The word
'class'
is fraught
with
unpleasing associations,
so that
to linger upon it
is apt
to be interpreted
as the symptom
of a perverted mind
and
a jaundiced spirit."
Especially in America,
where the idea of class
is notably embarrassing.
In his book
Inequality
in an Age
of Decline
(1980)
the sociologist
Paul Blumberg
goes so far
as to call it
"America's
forbidden thought."
Indeed,
people often
blow their tops
if the subject
is even broached.
One woman,
asked
by a couple
of interviewers
if she
thought there were
social classes
in this country,
answered:
"It's the dirtiest thing
I've ever heard of!"
And a man,
asked
the same question,
got
so angry
that he blurted out,
"Social class
should be
exterminated!"
Actually,
you
reveal
a great deal
about
your social class
by
the amount
of annoyance
or
fury
you feel
when the subject
is brought up.
A tendency
to get very anxious
suggests
that you
are middle-class
and
nervous
about slipping down
a rung or two.
On the other hand,
upper-class people
love the topic
to come up;
the more attention
paid to the matter
the better off
they seem to be.
Proletarians
generally don't mind
discussions
of the subject
because
they know
they can do little
to
alter
their class identity.
Thus the whole
class matter
is likely to seem
like a joke to them --
the upper classes
fatuous
in their
empty
aristocratic
pretentiousness,
the middles
loathsome
in their anxious gentility.
It is
the middle class
that is
highly class-sensitive,
and
sometimes
class-scared to death.
[...]
If you reveal
your class
by your outrage
at the very topic,
you reveal it also
by
the way
you define the thing
that's outraging you.
At the bottom,
people
tend to believe
that class
is defined by
the amount
of money
you have.
In the middle,
people grant
that
money
has something
to do with it,
but think
education
and
the kind of work
you do
almost
equally important.
Nearer the top,
people perceive
that
taste,
values,
ideas,
style,
and
behavior
are
indispensable criteria
of class,
regardless
of money
or occupation
or education.
[...]
Being told
that there are
no social classes
in the place
where
the interviewee lives
is
an old experience
for sociologists.
"'We don't have
classes
in our town'
almost invariably
is the first remark
recorded
by
the investigator,"
reports
Leonard Reissman,
author of
Class in American Life
(1959).
[...]
So powerful
is
"the fable
of equality,"
as Frances Trollope
called it
when she
toured America
in 1832,
so embarrassed
is the government
to confront
the subject --
in the thousands
of measurements
pouring from
its bureaus,
social class
is
not
officially recognized --
that
it is easy
for visitors
not to notice
the way
the class system works.
[...]
Like
the carpenter
who says:
"I hate to say there are
classes,
but
it's just that
people
are
more comfortable
with people
of
like backgrounds."
His grouping of people
by
"like backgrounds",
scientifically
uncertain as it may be,
is nearly
as good a way as any
to specify
what it is
that distinguishes
one class
from another.
If you
feel no need
to explicate your allusions
or
in any way
explain
what
you
mean,
you are probably talking
to someone in your class.
[...]
In this book
I am going to deal with
some of
the visible
and audible signs
of social class,
but I will be
sticking largely
with those
that reflect
choice.
That means
that I will not be
considering
matters of race,
or,
except now and then,
religion
or politics.
Race is
visible,
but it is not
chosen.
Religion
and politics,
while usually
chosen,
don't show,
except for
the occasional
front-yard shrine
or
car bumper sticker.
When you
look at a person
you don't see
"Roman Catholic"
or
"liberal":
you see
"hand-painted necktie"
or
"crappy polyester shirt";
you hear
parameters
or
in regards to.
In attempting
to make sense
of indicators
like these,
I have been
guided
by perception and feel
rather than
by any method
that could be
deemed "scientific",
believing
with Arthur Marwick,
author of
Class: Image and Reality (1980),
that
"class ...
is too serious a subject
to leave
to the social scientists."
It should be
a serious subject
in America especially,
because here
we lack
a convenient system
of inherited
titles,
ranks,
and honors,
and each generation
has to
define the hierarchies
all over again.
The society
changes faster
than
any other on earth,
and the American,
almost uniquely,
can be puzzled
about
where,
in the society,
he stands.
[...]
John Adams,
[...]
says,
as early as 1805:
"The rewards ...
in this life
are
esteem
and
admiration of others --
the punishments
are
neglect
and
contempt ...
The desire of
the esteem of others
is as real
a want
of nature
as hunger --
and
the neglect
and
contempt of the world
as severe a pain
as
the gout
or stone..."
About
the same time
the Irish poet
Thomas Moore,
sensing
the special predicament
Americans
were inviting
with their
egalitarian Constitution,
described
the citizens
of Washington, D.C.,
as creatures
"Born
to be slaves,
and
struggling
to be lords".
Thirty years later,
in
Democracy in America,
Alexis de Tocqueville
put his finger
precisely
on the special problems
of class
aspiration
here.
"Nowhere,"
he wrote,
"do citizens appear
so insignificant
as
in
a democratic nation."
Nowhere,
consequently,
is there
more strenuous
effort to achieve --
earn
would probably
not be
the right word --
significance.
[...]
That is,
where everybody
is somebody,
nobody
is anybody.
[...]
Because
the myth
conveys
the impression
that you
can readily
earn your way
upward,
disillusion
and bitterness
are particularly strong
when
you find yourself
trapped
in a class system
you've been
half persuaded
isn't
important.
When
in
early middle life
some people
discover
that
certain limits
have been placed
on
their capacity
to ascend socially
by such
apparent irrelevancies
as
heredity,
early environment,
and
the social class
of their immediate forebears,
they go
into something
like despair,
which,
if generally secret,
is no less destructive.
[...]
The force
of sheer
class envy
behind vile
and
even criminal behavior
in this country,
the result
in part
of disillusion
over
the official myth
of classlessness,
should never be
underestimated.
[...]
Despite
our
public embrace
of
political
and
judicial
equality,
in individual perception
and
understanding --
much of which
we refrain
from publicizing --
we
arrange things
vertically
and
insist
on
crucial differences
in
value.
Regardless
of what we say
about
equality,
I think everyone
at some point
comes to feel
like
the Oscar Wilde
who said,
"The brotherhood
of man
is not
a mere
poet's dream:
it is
a most depressing
and
humiliating
reality."
It's as if
in our heart of hearts
we don't want
agglomerations
but
distinctions.
Analysis
and
separation
we find
interesting,
synthesis
boring.
[...]
Those who sell
"executive desks"
and
related office furniture
know
that they
and
their clients
agree
on
a rigid "class" hierarchy.
Desks
made of oak
are
at the bottom,
and those
of walnut
are
next.
Then,
moving up,
mahogany
is, if you like,
"upper-middle class,"
until we arrive,
finally,
at
the apex: teak.
In the army,
at ladies'
social functions,
pouring the coffee
is the prerogative
of the
senior officer's wife
because,
as the ladies
all know,
coffee
outranks
tea.
There seems
no place
where
hierarchical
status-orderings
aren't discoverable.
Take
musical
instruments.
[...]
... to hear
"My boy's
taking lessons
on
the viola da gamba"
is
to receive
a powerful
signal of class,
the kind attaching
to
antiquarianism
and
museum,
gallery,
or
"educational" work.
Guitars
(except
when played
in "classical" --
that is,
archaic -- style)
are low
by nature,
and
that is why
they were
so often employed
as
tools
of intentional
class degradation
by
young people
in
the 1960s and '70s.
The guitar
was
the perfect instrument
for the purpose
of signaling
these
young people's flight
from
the
upper-middle
and
middle classes,
associated
as it is
with
Gypsies,
cowhands,
and
other personnel
without
inherited
or
often
even earned
money
and
without
fixed residence.
[...]
Nobody
knows for sure
what the word
CLASS
means.
[...]
I do wish
the word caste
were domesticated
in the United States,
because
it nicely conveys
the actual rigidity
of
class lines here,
the difficulty
of moving --
either upward
or downward --
out of the place
where
you were nurtured.
How many
classes
are there?
The simplest answer
is that
there are
only two,
the rich
and
the poor,
employer
and
employed,
landlord
and
tenant,
bourgeois
and
proletariat.
[...]
Paul Blumberg
notes
"a fundamental
class cleavage"
today
between
people
who can afford
to buy a house --
any house --
and
people
who can't,
a fairly elevated
version
of
the distinction
down below
between
those who
own cars
and
those who
must depend
on
public transportation
and
who thus
spend a great deal
of their time
waiting around
for the bus
to show up.
[...]
In
The
Working-Class
Majority (1974),
Andrew Levinson says,
"All the clichés
and
pleasant notions
of
how the old
class divisions ...
have disappeared
are exposed
as hollow phrases
by the simple fact
that
American workers
must accept
serious injury
and
even death
as
part of
their daily
reality
while
the middle class
does not."
And he goes on:
"Imagine ...
the universal outcry
that would occur
if every year
several
corporate headquarters
routinely collapsed
like mines,
crushing
sixty or seventy
executives.
Or suppose
that all the banks
were filled
with an invisible
noxious dust
that constantly
produced cancer
in the
managers,
clerks,
and tellers.
Finally,
try to imagine
the horror ...
if thousands
of university professors
were
deafened every year
or
lost fingers,
hands,
sometimes eyes,
while
on their jobs."
And speaking
of death and injury,
probably
the most awful
class division
in
America,
one that cuts deeply
across the center
of society
and
that will poison
life here
for generations,
is
the one separating
those
whose
young people
were killed
or savaged
in
the Vietnam War
and
those who,
thanks largely
to
the infamous S-2 deferment
for
college students,
escaped.
Anyone uncertain
about
class consciousness
in this country
should listen
to
a working-class father
whose son
was killed:
"I'm bitter.
You
bet
your goddam dollar
I'm bitter.
It's people
like us
who give up
our sons
for
the country.
The business people,
they
run the country
and
make money from it.
The college types,
the professors,
they go
to Washington
and
tell the government
what to do...
But
their sons,
they
don't end up
in
the swamps
over there,
in
Vietnam.
No, sir."
And
a mother
adds:
"We
can't understand
how all those
rich kids --
the kids
with beads
from
the suburbs --
how
they get off
when
my son
had to go."
[...]
In Britain
three
has been
popularly accepted
as
the number of classes
at least
since
the last century,
when
Matthew Arnold
divided
his neighbors
and friends
into
upper,
middle,
and
lower classes,
or
as he
memorably
termed them,
Barbarians
(at the top, notice),
Philistines
(in the middle),
and
Populace.
This
three-tiered
conception
is
the usual way
to think
of
the class system
for people
in the middle,
for
it offers them
moral
and
social
safety,
positioning them
equally distant
from
the vices
of
pride
and
snobbery
and
waste
and
carelessness,
which they associate
with those
above them,
and
dirtiness,
constraint,
and shame,
the attendants
of
those below.
[...]
My researches
have persuaded me
that
there are nine classes
in this country,
as follows:
Top out-of-sight
Upper
Upper middle
--------
Middle
High proletarian
Mid-proletarian
Low proletarian
--------
Destitute
Bottom out-of-sight
[...]
"Economically,
no doubt,
there are
only two classes,
the rich
and
the poor,"
says George Orwell,
"But socially
there is
a whole hierarchy
of classes,
and
the manners
and traditions
learned by each class
in childhood
are not only
very different
but --
this is
the essential point --
generally
persist
from birth to death ...
It is ...
very difficult
to escape,culturally,
from
the class
into which
you
have been born."
When
John Fitzgerald Kennedy,
watching
Richard Nixon
on television,
turned
to his friends
and, horror-struck,
said,
"The guy
has
no class,"
he
was not talking
about money.
[...]
And down
below,
the principle
still holds:
money
doesn't matter
that much.
To illustrate
the point,
John Brooks
compares
two families
living
in adjoining houses
in a suburb.
One man
is "blue-collar",
a
garage mechanic.
The other
is "white-collar",
an employee
in
a publishing house.
They make
roughly
the same amount
of money,
but
what a difference.
"Mr. Blue"
bought
a small neat
"ranch house".
"Mr. White"
bought
a beat-up
old house
and
refurbished it
himself.
Mrs. Blue
uses the local shops,
especially those
in the nearby
shopping center,
and thinks them
wonderful,
"so convenient."
Mrs. White
goes
to the city
to
buy her clothes.
The Blues
drink,
but rather
furtively,
and
usually
on Saturday night
with
the curtains closed.
The Whites
drink
openly,
often
right out
in the backyard.
"The Blues
shout
to each other,
from
room to room
of their house
or
from
corner to corner
on their lot,
without
self-consciousness;
the Whites
modulate
their voices
to the point
where
they sometimes
can't hear
each other."
As
household objects,
books
are
a crucial criterion.
There's
not
a book
in the Blues' house,
while
the Whites'
living room
contains
numerous
full bookshelves.
Brooks
concludes:
"Here,
in sum,
are two families
with
hardly anything
in common ...,
yet
their ...
incomes
are
practically identical."
Likewise,
it was
Russell Lyne's
awareness
that
it's less money
than
taste
and
knowledge
and
perceptiveness
that
determine class
that
some years ago
prompted him
to set forth
the tripartite scheme
of
highbrow,
middlebrow,
and
lowbrow.
Not that
the three classes
at the top
don't have money.
The point is
that
money alone
doesn't
define them,
for the way
they have
their money
is largely
what matters.
That is,
as a class indicator
the amount
of
money
is less significant
than
the source.
The main thing
distinguishing
the top three classes
from each other
is the amount of money
inherited
in relation to
the amount
currently earned.
The
top-out-of-sight
class
(Rockefellers,
Pews,
DuPonts,
Mellons,
Fords,
Vanderbilts)
lives
on inherited capital
entirely.
No one
whose money,
no matter
how copious,
comes from
his own work --
film stars
are an example --
can be
a member
of the
top-out-of-sight class,
even if
the size
of
his income
and
the extravagance
of
his expenditure
permit him
to
simulate identity
with it.
Inheritance --
"old money"
in
the vulgar phrase --
is
the indispensable
principle
defining
the top
three classes,
and
it's best
if the money's
been
in the family
for
three
or
four generations.
[...]
It was
the
Great Depression,
Vance Packard
speculates,
that
badly frightened
the
very rich,
teaching them
to
be "discreet,
almost reticent,
in
exhibiting
their wealth."
[...]
The situation now
is very different
from
the one in the 1890s
satirized
by Thorstein Veblen
in The Theory
of the Leisure Class.
In his day the rich
delighted
to exhibit themselves
conspicuously,
with
costly retainers
and
attendants
much in evidence.
Now
they hide,
not merely
from
envy
and
revenge
but from
expose journalism
much advanced
in
cunning and ferocity
since
Veblen's time,
and
from an even worse
threat,
virtually
unknown to Veblen,
foundation mendicancy,
with
its hordes
of beggars
in three-piece suits
constantly
badgering
the well-to-do.
Showing off
used to be
the main satisfaction
of being
very rich
in America.
Now
the rich
must skulk
and hide.
It's a pity.
And it's not just that
the individual houses
and
often the persons
of the top-out-of-sights
are
removed from scrutiny.
Their very class
tends to escape
the down-to-earth
calculations
of sociologists
and poll-takers
and consumer researchers.
It's not studied
because
it's literally
out of sight,
and
a questionnaire proffered
to
a top-out-of-sight person
will very likely
be
hurled to the floor
with disdain.
Very much,
in fact,
the way it would be
ignored
by
a bottom-out-of-sight
person.
And it's here
that we begin
to perceive
one of
the
most wonderful things
about
the
American class system --
the curious
similarity,
if not actual
brotherhood,
of the top-
and
bottom-out-of-sights.
Just as the tops
are hidden away
on their islands
or behind
the peek-a-boo walls
of their distant estates,
the bottoms
are equally invisible,
when
not put away
in institutions
or
claustrated in monasteries,
lamaseries,
or
communes,
then
hiding
from creditors,
deceived
bail-bondsmen,
and
gulled merchants
intent
on repossessing cars
and furniture.
[...]
In aid
of invisibility,
members
of both classes
feel
an equal anxiety
to keep
their names
out of the papers.
And
the bottoms --
"the lower
or
spurious
leisure class,"
Veblen calls them --
share
something more
with
the top-out-of-sights.
They do not
earn
their money.
They are
given it
and
kept afloat
not by
their own efforts
or merits
but by
the welfare machinery
or
the correctional system,
the
way the tops
owe it all
to their ancestors.
And
a further similarity:
members
of both classes
carry
very little cash
on their persons.
We can say,
in summary,
that
the virtual identity,
in important respects,
of top-
and bottom-
out-of-sights
is
a remarkable example
of
the time-proven principle
that Extremes Meet.
The next class
down,
the upper class,
differs from
the top-out-of-sight class
in
two main ways.
First,
although
it inherits
a lot
of its money,
it earns quite a bit
too,
usually from
some attractive,
if slight, work,
without which
it would
feel bored
and
even ashamed.
It's likely
to make its money
by controlling banks
and
the more historic
corporations,
think tanks,
and foundations,
and
to busy itself
with things
like
the older universities,
the Council on Foreign Relations,
the Foreign Policy Association,
the Committee for
Economic Development,
and the like,
together
with
the executive branch
of the federal government,
and
often the Senate.
In the days
when ambassadors
were amateurs,
they were selected
largely
from this class,
very seldom
from
the top-out-of-sight.
And secondly,
unlike
the top-out-of-sights,
the upper class
is visible,
often ostentatiously so.
Which is to say
that
the top-out-of-sights
have
spun off and away
from
Veblen's scheme
of conspicuous exhibition,
leaving
the mere upper class
to carry on
its former role.
When you
pass a house
with
a would-be
impressive facade
visible
from the street
or highway,
you know
it's occupied
by a member
of the upper class.
The White House
is probably
the best example.
Its residents,
even on
those occasions
when they are
Franklin D. Roosevelts
or even
John F. Kennedys,
can never be
designated
top-out-of-sight
but only
upper class.
The house
is simply
too showy,
being
pure white
and
carefully positioned
on high ground,
and
temporary residence
there
usually constitutes
a come-down
for most
of its occupants.
It is
a hopelessly
upper-class place --
or
even lower
than that,
as when
the Harry Trumans
lived there.
[...]
[All items above
were drawn from
pages 1 - 22
of the book "Class"]
+++
Whether you
learn to read
at
a good
or
bad college
or at
a good
or
bad prep school
or
high school,
what
you read
is an
almost infallible
class signal.
(And
whether
you read
at all.
"The divisions
between
those
who read and write
and
those who don't,"
says Tom Wolfe,
"are
taking on
a great
social significance.")
The taste
in reading
of the upper classes
is
soon dispatched.
C. Wright Mills
is correct
when
he observes
that although
they may
display books,
they tend
not to read them
except
books
on "management"
and
copious
mystery
and detective
narratives,
forgotten
as soon
as consumed.
They read
magazines mostly,
precisely those
John T. Molloy
recommends
disposing
about
the office waiting room
to convey
an upper-middle-class
air:
Time,
Newsweek,
and
U. S. News & World Report;
and
Fortune,
Forbes,
Business Week,
Barron's,
and
Dun's Review.
If you're
an author
and you give
one
of your books
to a member
of
the upper class,
you must never
expect him
to read it.
[...]
[drawn
from page 163]
+++
Some of these
class dividers
are crude.
Others
are subtle.
The upper
and upper-middle classes
have
a special vocabulary
for indicating
wearisome
or
unhappy
social situations.
They say
iresome
or
tedious
where
their social inferiors
would say
boring;
they say
upset
or
distressed
or even
cross
where others
would say
angry
or
mad
or
sore.
There's
a special
upper-class diction
of
approval too.
No prole man
would
call something
super (Anglophilic)
or
outstanding (prep school),
just as
it would sound
like flagrant affectation
for
a prole woman
to
designate something
seen
in a store
as divine
or darling
or adorable.
Nice
would be
the
non-upper way
of putting it.
But
it's the middle-class
quest
for grandeur
and gentility
that produces
the
most interesting effects.
As we've seen,
imported words
especially
are its downfall.
It will speak of
a graffiti
and it thinks
chauvinism
has something to do
with
gender aggression.
Pseudo-classical
plurals
are
a constant pitfall:
the middles
will speak learnedly
of
a phenomena
and a
criteria
and
a strata
and
(referring
perhaps
to a newspaper)
a media.
A well-known
author
is
a literati.
It thinks
context
a grander form
of the word
content,
and
thus says things
like
"I didn't like
the context
of that book:
all that
blood and gore."
Or
consider
the official
Coast Guard officer
reporting
a grievous oil spill
in San Francisco Bay:
cross
is too vulgar
a term
for the occasion,
he imagines,
and so
he says that
"several ships
transited
the area."
When
after
a succession
of solecisms
of this kind
a middle-class
person
will begin
to suspect
that
he is
blowing his cover,
he may try
to
reestablish status
by appliqueing
a mock-classical
plural ending
onto
a perfectly
ordinary word
like process.
Then
he
will say
process-sees.
The whole
middle-class
performance
nicely illustrates
the conclusion
of Lord Melbourne.
"The higher
and
lower classes,
there's
some good
in them,"
he observed,
"But
the middle classes
are all
affectation
and
conceit
and
pretense
and
concealment."
[...]
[drawn from page 180]
+++
The X
Way Out
"X" people
are better
conceived
as
belonging to
a category
than
a class
because
you are not
born
an X person,
as you are
born
and
reared
a prole
or a middle.
You
become
an X person,
or
to put it
more bluntly,
you earn
X-personhood
by
a strenuous effort
of discovery
in which
curiosity
and
originality
are indispensible.
And
in discovering
that
you can become
an X person
you find
the
only escape
from class.
Entering
category X
often requires
flight
from
parents
and
forebears.
The young
flocking
to the cities
to
devote themselves
to
"art",
"writing",
"creative work" --
anything,
virtually,
that
liberates them
from
the presence
of a boss
or supervisor --
are
aspirant X people,
and
if they succeed
in capitalizing
on
their talents,
they
may end
as fully fledged
X types.
What kind
of people
are Xs?
The old-fashioned
term
bohemians
gives
some idea;
so does
the term
the talented.
Some Xs
are
intellectuals,
but
a lot are not:
they are
actors,
musicians,
artists,
sports stars,
"celebrities",
well-to-do
former hippies,
confirmed
residers abroad,
and
the more gifted
journalists,
those
whose by-lines
intelligent readers
recognize
with
pleasant anticipation.
X people
can be described
as
(to use
C. Wright Mills's
term)
"self-cultivated".
They
tend to be
self-employed,
doing what
social scientists
call
autonomous work.
If,
as Mills has said,
the
middle-class person
is
"always
somebody's man,"
the X person
is
nobody's,
and
his freedom
from supervision
is one
of
his most obvious
characteristics.
X people
are
independent-minded,
free
of anxious regard
for
popular shibboleths,
loose in carriage
and
demeanor.
They adore
the work they do,
and
they do it
until they are
finally
carried out,
"retirement"
being
a concept
meaningful only
to
hired personnel
or
wage slaves
who
despise their work.
Being
an X person
is likean X person
having
much
of the freedom
and
some of the power
of
a top-out-of-sight
or
upper-class person,
but
without the money.
X category
is a sort of
unmonied
aristocracy.
[...]
[drawn from pages 212 - 213]
+++
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