Friday, 5 April 2013

What class are you?

I completed the Great British Class Calculator on the BBC website.

I discovered I'm part of the Emergent Social Worker. It means I have no money but I have a varied cultural and social life. Great!

I'm part of a group that's financially insecure, low on savings and house value but I score high on social and cultural factors.

Like many British people, I find class fascinating. It's so much more complex and interesting than in other countries. When I think about class both on a personal and general level, it's so much more complex and subtle issue to debate.

I think what I like about about this new report that's been produced, is that it tries to address some of these complexities.

Rather than having the three traditional classes of Upper, Middle and Working class - we now have 7 different classes in which to identify with.

Your have: Elite, Established Middle Class, Technical Middle Class, New Affluent Workers, Emergent Service Workers, Traditional Working Class and Precariat.

What this does take into account is people's economic, social and cultural capital and interests.

When I look at myself, I know that in terms of my education, job and salary I'm Middle Class. Yet when I look at my background and upbringing I always associate myself with being working class.

It's left me confused as depending on the question and what mood I'm in, I will answer differently if you ask me what class I am.

Even though I still feel I come from a working class background, the working class culture I identify with doesn't seem to fit in with the chav/council estate stereotype that seems to dominate today. Yet when I acknowledge that on many levels I'm now middle class I still feel this is a class I've entered and wasn't born into.

Should it matter? On a lot of levels it shouldn't. Isn't it about

'Where you're at - not where you're from'?

You'd like to think so but being British where you come from and where you are now on the social ladder is still so important to many of us.



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