Education and Class

Ok, NOW, we’re talking about class, as Ali Eteraz writes (among many other important things)

Anytime the media wants to cast aspersions upon Obama, to diminish his chances to be elected, to give voice to smears against him, to suggest that he is a Muslim, or a black-nationalist, or a socialist, or a Eunuch, or some Chameleonesque mixture of all of those things, suddenly these concerns are put in the mouth of “the working class.”

Read the whole essay. It is worth the effort of a mouse click, and once you’re there you’ll keep reading.

Trust me.

Fox News analysts snicker their way through their demeaning analysis of class in America:

Thanks to TennesseeFree.com for the tip.

The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal acknowledged it, with their series on social class in the U.S. several years ago.

I’ve heard the term “working class” more in this presidential campaign that I’ve heard it in the past 10 years.

And now Greenwood Press acknowledges it, with the publication of this three volume encyclopedia on Class in America.

How long, then, before we can just start teaching and talking about class in schools?

Separated by a Common Language has written an intriguing post about the ways that Americans and the British talk about class– or, to be more accurate, about how Americans talk about occupation (”blue collar”, “white collar”) while the British talk about class.

Phrasing class-talk in terms of job types or income sits well with the American discomfort with class-differentiation. Putting people into classes seems like it’s defining who they are, whereas defining them in terms of job describes what they do and defining them in terms of income is by what they are getting. Doing and getting are activities, and activities are changeable. Being is a state, and more time-stable (a term from linguist Talmy Givón), and therefore perceived as less inherently changeable. If you’re uncomfortable with describing someone as being something, a solution is to describe them as doing something or having something done to them. This fits with the American notion of equality of opportunity.

And thus, the enormous challenges of doing anything about class, when we cannot even speak of it.

Science (and so much more) blogger Joe Henderson tells it like it is in his link-rich post as he invites us to “enjoy” class matters that have been crossing his radar.

He writes:

It seems to me that [class] is the most salient issue facing social systems right now. My sense is that we’re beginning to enter a time that might finally be right to have the “courageous conversation” about social class. I hope we’re capable of having this conversation… I hope…

So, who’s ready to move this conversation forward?