Talk:American middle class/Archive 1

GA dispute
There's a dispute open on this page's status, right now, the lead really needs to be structured to actually be in different paragraphs, and there's a concern about broadness due to the lack of discussion concerning the historical origins of the "middle class" on WP:GA/R. Can any editors to this page fix these things? Homestarmy 13:17, 11 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, I'm the only editor and yes I can fix those things. I will divide the intro into paragraphs and add a history section. All in all, I should be done about tomorrow evenging (Pacific Time GT -8) Regards,  Signature brendel  17:08, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Elitism?
Writer is implying that "professional" class is superior to "blue collar" middle class. This comment was left by 66.90.184.83.


 * Not superior in the sense of they're better-I'm not a snob. Professionals such economists, political scientists, etc... do, however, rank higher on the social strata than say dental hygenists or blue collar workers. They have higher educational attainment, have self-directed, complex jobs, get paid more and thus rank "higher" on the socio-economic scale-which is why they're often refered to as being "upper middle class." Just look at income and education. The median income for a male, age 25 or older with a Ph.D. is $73,853. The overall medain income for a male 25+ is $33,517 and that for the same male with an AA is $39,015.US Census Bureau, Personal Income by education Keep in mind this is personal, not household income. I know the vertical class alignement seems snobbish sometimes, but please consider that this article does not intent to imply that the "'professional' class is superior to 'blue collar' middle class." Regards,  Signature brendel  18:36, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

What is an AA?
What do they mean by the acronym AA? This comment was added by 216.153.166.226.


 * AA stands for Associates Degree. Some schools, mostly community colleges and private vocational schools, award students an Associates Degree or AA after two years of study. Students may then attend a university for another two years to earn their Bachelor's. In other words, an AA, is a degree awarded to some college students after successful completetion of their sophemore year (or at least completing the typical course work of the two first college years). Regards,  Signature brendel  Now under review! 00:28, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Actually AA stands for Administrative Assistant. It can also mean "Associate of Arts", but not every Associates Degree is an AA. --Itinerant1 01:23, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes but in this article it refrs to an Associates Degree (at least according to the Census Bureau). Regards,  Signature brendel  HAPPY HOLIDAYS 01:44, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Care to point to a place where the Census Bureau uses this acronym? --Itinerant1 21:34, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Look in a college catalog AA or ask a professor whether or not the acronym is used for an Associates Degree. I use it refer to Census data regarding Asociate degree holders and not admin assistants. True the acronym also refers to admin assitants, alcohlics anonymous and Associates degree-in this article it refers to the academic degree, not alcoholics or office workers.  Signature brendel  HAPPY HOLIDAYS 01:10, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Fussell
It can't really hurt to have a section about Fussell's view, even if it's not in a complete agreement with other sociologists. He's respected enough that his book is used as a material in many sociology courses.
 * http://condor.depaul.edu/~soc/courses/syllabi/06autumn/101Barker06Autumn.pdf
 * http://www.unc.edu/~kurzman/Soc250.htm
 * http://ase.tufts.edu/sociology/documents/courses2005Spring.pdf
 * http://faculty.adams.edu/~sjgonzales/soc_recommended_readings.htm --Itinerant1 21:57, 16 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Yeah, but it's still a pop book that's now 23 years old. I put it up originally becuase like you I thought "Well can't hurt." But the more I think about it the less I used it as a source. Some things are also really doubtful and he contradicts himself in several places (he mentions that professors are upper middle class and then talks about the upper middle class like they were the nuveau riche). Furthermore most sociology course are likely to only feature him to study a set of sterotypes-part of sociology is analysing seterotypes-and that's what Fussell's book is: stereotypes (from 1983 and quite East-coast centric). Sociologist basically use his book to say: "Look here's one guy's take (steretypes) on class in America." Then the instructor will probably ask student "well what part do you agree with? Why? Why not?-books like Fussell's are a great tool in teaching that art of critical thinking. But you can't present Fussell as if it were a sociology book (and that's what I did wrong when I wrote this article)- it's a pop book whose seterotypes are worth studying in a sociology course where the instructor gives the right context (I can't do that here in WP-so I need to use a "fool-proof" example that isn't going to be mis-interpreted and will tell people what sociologist think really is the class model today). Fact of the matter is that I beleive an actual sociology text book written by sociology professors (not Literature professors) is a better source. Regards,  Signature brendel  HAPPY HOLIDAYS 01:04, 17 December 2006 (UTC)