[ExI] Linguistic Markers of Class

Lee Corbin lcorbin at rawbw.com
Mon May 28 17:13:36 UTC 2007


Stathis writes

> > [Lee wrote]
> > 
> > Low class:           blue collar, also called "the proles" by Fussell and Orwell
> >                            Today many elementary and high school teachers are lower
> >                            class, which has changed from 1950. 

Again, this is not meant as opprobrium. That is, I do not mean
the colloquial "they have no class". I mean it, as Damien would
say as "a contingent  sociological adjunct, no more an
index of moral worth than eye color, height...".

> In what sense are teachers "lower class": income, social status,
> class of origin, accent, education (!), something else?

All of the above!  Even in 1970 when I got a teaching certificate
from the University of California, what a difference there was
between the "normal" classes I was taking and the education
classes:  the young women (for the most part) who were taking
the school teacher route seemed a fairly brainless lot. But in
those long ago days, they still spoke the same way as the rest
of us at the university, and still appeared in all respects to be
middle class.

> They are certainly white collar rather than blue collar, if
> those terms retain any of their literal meaning. 

Yes, but with more and more diversity of every kind, indeed,
many of our terms and understandings are having to undergo
change.

Lee




More information about the extropy-chat mailing list