In discussions about class and culture, people often want to know a simple definition of the term class. The class system itself is quite a simple to define. It is a hierarchical structure that categorises people based on their social status. It is not a rigid structure so allows for some movement (social mobility) between its categories. In essence, it is a socio-cultural classification system for categorising people according to their social standing.
What is harder to define are the classes themselves. When people are looking for definitions of class, more often than not they want to know what working or middle class actually mean. What are their key markers? How do we know who is working and who is middle class? Much like the term Evangelicalism, trying to define these things is a bit like trying to pick up a wet bar soap in the shower. These things are often felt and recognised more easily than they are defined.
Typically, there are four broad ways that people might speak about class. It is usually helpful to figure out which of these understandings is on display. Some might even switch between them when speaking. It is also worth remembering there is crossover between them. That is, one could primarily use one of these definitions below, but that definition could, in several respects, incorporate other of the definitions or at least aspects of them.
First, there is a primarily economic analysis. This way of discussing class is not mainly about how much money one has. Rather, it focuses on where that money comes from and where in the economic system one sits. The primary question on this view is whether you rely on your labour to live, you profit off the labour of others to live or you rely on your assets to live. Typical of such definitions is the one given by the trade unionist and former General Secretary of the RMT, Mick Lynch:
Second, Some would argue for what is best described as an occupational view of class. Here, they determine class almost entirely by the job somebody does. Primarily, this understanding lands hard on the National Readership Survey, which categorised social grades from A-E by occupation as follows:
According to this view, the working-class are associated with the C2, D and E categories while anybody in C1 and above is considered middle-class. On this view, your class is almost entirely determined by the job that you do. Typical of this kind of view is Paul Embery in his book Despised:
I use the term ‘working-class’ as I have understood it all my life. I use it as many of my friends and neighbours and workmates understand it. I use it it in a broad sense in the way that, I suspect, the man on the Clapham omnibus or in the Red Lion understands it – to describe a stratum of society whose members often do the toughest and most grinding jobs (consisting, for example, of physical labour or work in blue-collar industries, factories, call centres, retail or frontline public services); those whose wages and social status are generally at the lower end of the scale; those who own little or no property or wealth, beyond perhaps their own home and some modest savings; those who are likely to have little authority or control in their workplace; those who live in the grittier parts of Britain, particularly our post-industrial, small-town or coastal communities and those districts of our cities that haven’t yet succumbed to gentrification or been colonised by the professional classes; those who are unemployed or more likely to be in receipt of benefits; and so on.
Third, others would take what might best be described as the cultural view of class. In this definition, whilst money may be a factor, it is not especially relevant. Rather, social markers, values and cultural outlook are the primary markers. Typifying this position is the musician, Paul Weller (there’s some swearing in it so skip the video if it bothers you. I suspect those who hold to this cultural definition would immediately see you skipping the video for that reason and peg you as middle class!)
On this cultural view, class is primarily determined by personal characteristics like accent and lifestyle, homeownership and education, and above all else values and outlook. Whilst for some other definitions (cf. Paul Embery’s example above), many of these things might be seen as symptoms of class i.e. they are class markers that do not define class itself but are a product of it, the cultural view of class essentially views these markers as defining features of class demarcation.
Fourth, there is the more academic understanding of class. Most sociologists would reference Pierre Bourdieu and his understanding of class as economic, social and cultural capital. These, Bourdieu argued, are the ways in which wealth, power and privilege are accumulated and exchanged in society. For Bourdieu, class is a spectrum. Those with low total capital (social, economic and cultural) would be working class whilst those with high total capital (social, economic and cultural) are the upper class. Evidently, those who sit somewhere between would be middle class.
In the simplest terms, economic capital refers to monetary wealth including stocks, shares, pensions and other such financial assets. Cultural capital refers to social assets of an individual. Bourdieu breaks this into three categories: institutionalised cultural capital (the formal recognition of intellectual cultural capital, typically qualifications and credentials), objectified cultural capital (material cultural goods that can be exchanged for profit e.g. art works, books, antiques, etc) and embodied cultural capital (the knowledge, skills, style of speech, manners, etc that you naturally carry). Finally, social capital refers to the network of relationships, connections, and group memberships a person can access. These networks include family ties, influential friends, alumni networks, professional networks, private members groups, etc. They are the networks that can be drawn upon for personal benefit.
This academic theory would argue that all three forms of capital (economic, social and cultural) work interchangeably in our lives. It is possible to exchange one form of capital for another. One could spend economic capital to gain cultural capital which would help with obtaining social capital that improves our social standing. Similarly, one could utilise cultural capital to gain economic capital which is then spent on entering private members clubs improving your social capital. You could use your social capital to gain access to particular assets that you use your economic capital to purchase. Each form of capital can be leveraged as a means of improving social standing. Likewise, one could make bad investments and lose any form of capital so that their social standing falls.
Of course, of the making of definitions there is no end. As Paul Embery is apt to note, ‘all of the above definitions have some legitimacy, and all have their weaknesses. There will likely never be a universally accepted definition of “working class”. You pays your money and takes your choice.’
When it comes to ‘working class’, for me, Paul Embery’s definition nails it. It is the stock from which I come: hard working people, doing jobs, not for personal fulfilment, but simply to ‘keep the wolf from the door,’ and hoping to give their kids a chance of an easier life.
I think Embery’s describes something, but I think it is incomplete and (frankly) out of date. I think Bourdieu’s is the more helpful, more nuanced and has the broader explanatory power. Bourdieu better explains why people with money may still be working class and those who have lost a lot of money might not be. It explains how a person can go up a ladder in their job and yet remain essentially working class whilst others who do not rise high may remain middle class. I think its explanatory scope is better. Embery’s leans too heavily on vibes of a certain kind, I think.
Yes, all true. Far more up to date…. But then, things have changed so much ( as reflected in Bourdieu’s description), is it even worth talking about class any more? I confess I feel a bit uncomfortable doing it. Embery describes things as I remember them. When things were a bit more ‘black and white’ without all the new shades of grey on a class spectrum.
If we talk about class, into which class do the unemployed fit? Some are reluctantly unemployed… due to changes in the economic climate… socially and culturally they may still sit on the middle class part of the spectrum, but economically they may be poor. Then there’s the habitually unemployed, who have never worked and don’t want to…. To which class do they belong?
This is the strength, I think, of Bourdieu’s categories. I think it gives us appropriate language and ways of speaking about those who, on a more traditional view, don’t appear to obviously fit anywhere. Thinking about their economic, cultural and social capital is useful. Some middle class people who find themselves on benefits for a short time still have all sorts of cultural and social capital that can serve them even in that situation; capital that working class people just don’t have.
As for still talking about class, the reality is that it still exists, it is still and issue and it continues to permeate our society (and churches) in ways that affect how we interact with one another. When a large section of the population are missing from our churches, but we can’t speak about class, how are we to describe who isn’t there and what the problem is and where they stem from and, more importantly, how we can do anything about it?
I suppose I recoil from the idea of ‘classifying’ people. Pigeon holing them…. Seeing them as anything other than creatures made in the image of God. Stereo typing. Once we classify people we can’t help treating them as stereotypes. Which feels offensive whether you’re on the giving or receiving end.
Is it wrong, on that basis, to talk about English or Scottish people and their particular shared characteristics and cultural assumptions? Or perhaps to speak of white, Asian and black people and their respective differences and the assumptions that might go along with it?
The tendency to say, ‘I don’t like classification; it is pigeon-holing’ effectively kills off the entire sciences of anthropology and sociology and will cause us significant problems for attempting to understand anything about history or politics. Perhaps worst of all, it kills off any gospel concern for the very people who are missing from our churches and any effort we might expend to welcome them should they turn up or we attempt to reach them.
If we don’t understand why people are different, and how they think differently, and why and how they operate differently to us, we can’t be that surprised when we never reach them with the gospel and why they never stay with us if they dare to enter our churches. The ‘we’re all just image bearers’ line seeks to smooth over cultural differences so that we perpetuate the assumptions of our majority culture. It is our christianised version of people talking about being ‘colour blind’ and ‘not seeing colour’. Being image-bearers matters and has implications for all these discussions, but it doesn’t flatten and kill off our (legit) cultural difference nor free us from having to address our sin that we fail to see because our culture says it is fine.
All of which is to say, these things aren’t necessarily about pigeon-holing people. They are about understanding whole groups of people. How they think, why they are what they are, and – most importantly – how we can best include and welcome them. If we don’t want to do this, chances are we will be making it very hard for them to enter the kingdom, and we know what Jesus had to say about those who put stumbling blocks in the way of those who would come to him!