Official Philip Nel Question #10: Class

[GulPlum]

No: HPFGUIDX 41268

Porphyria <porphyria at m...> wrote:

> 1. What can we say about the Muggle/Wizard distinction? Is it 
> fundamentally elitist that Muggles are incapable of becoming 
Wizards?

I wouldn't say so. I don't think the wizard world is presented as 
being "elitist" vis-a-vis the Muggle world. After all, the whole 
concept of an "elite" includes notions of a ruling clique, which 
(more or less benignly) wields power over those blow them. 

Wizards are inherently, as a fact of nature, more powerful than 
Muggles - even not knowing why, Harry is able to escape to a rooftop, 
to make a glass window disappear, etc. He and his powers scare the 
bejeezus out of the Muggles surrounding him. His attitude, even after 
he learns of his heritage, is a mirror of the attitude of the 
wizarding world as a whole towards the Muggles - they have no 
intention or desire to take up an elite position and rule them, 
although it would be fairly easy for them to do so. 

They deliberately and consciouly cut themselves off from the Muggle 
world at the end of the 17th century, primarily to escape 
persecution. (As an aside, just what is it they feared? We're 
informed that burning was ineffectual and considered a joke by the 
magical community, and they just continued on their merry way.)

More recently, the wizarding world has developed its own parallel 
society which interacts with the Muggle world only when it can be a 
danger to the *Muggle* world (ie the MoM informing the Muggle 
authorities of Blakc's escape). 

It's interesting that the DEs' idea of fun is to torture and kill 
Muggles - these people don't appear to want to rule the Muggle world, 
but to eradicate it. 

Muggles cannot become wizards not because of some form of bigotry on 
the wizards' part, but because of a freak of nature. Hermione has 
(apparently, at least) 100% Muggle genes. Yet she isn't one. She 
didn't ask or be invited to "join the club", she became a member of 
it because of an accident of birth. 

Muggles cannot become wizards any more than black people can become 
white (or vice versa). Sure, in the real (Western) world the whites 
are the elite, but this because in Europe there are more of us, and 
in colonial countries, our forebears were the ones with the weapons 
who forcibly subjugated the natives. 

Giving the wizarding world an elite status vis-a-vis Muggles is 
indeed akin to our (western world's) relationship with native African 
or South American bushmen. Until fairly recently, they were 
considered (openly and formally) as "savages"; "we", on the other 
hand, were "civilised". Nowadays, despite having more fire-power and 
ostensibly being better educated and having all the benefits of 
modern technology, "we" regard them not as inferior, but 
as "different" and entitled to live their lives according to their 
own cultural values. We don't consider ourselves "elitist" in this 
regard, just with a different set of goals and different tools to 
attain them. 

Both worlds exist in ignorance of the other. We, the technologically 
empowered, have ways of knowing what these tribes get up to, but we 
choose to leave them alone, and most of us know little, if anything, 
about them. They don't have the ability to spy on us (as far as we 
know!) :-) and generally have no need for what we have to offer. 

Sounds familiar? :-)

> 2. Is there anything wrong with the books' depiction of Muggles? Do 
they 
> unfairly bear the brunt of hostility? The Dursleys are a satire of 
the 
> petit bourgeoisie -- social climbers. But isn't Harry a social 
climber? Is 
> Hermione? Do the books associate sadism and pettiness with the 
middle 
> class via the Dursleys? 

I find it interesting that you choose to underline the Durselys as 
petite bourgeoisie but don't mention their wizard world counterparts, 
the Malfoys. Actually, that's perhaps a little unfair: the Dursleys 
are definitely parvenus - they don't have actual *class* -  they 
dream of a holiday home in Majorca, FGS! Few ambitions are less 
*common*! (now, if they'd said Tuscany, or Greece, or Provence...).
On the other hand, the Malfoys are landed gentry and Lucius behaves 
patronistically towards those around him.

JKR gives full vent to her socialistic, egalitarian principles: she 
shows a defnite preference for salt-of-the earth types, and their 
foibles (Arthur Weasley's writing of loopholes into legislation for 
his own benefit; Hagrid's affection for dangerous creatures) are 
presented as charming, whereas the Dursleys' or Malfoys' social 
behaviour is off-putting.

That said, I don't think that JKR is setting up the Durselys or 
Malfoys as archetypes of their class - after all, Harry and his 
parents are/were independently wealthy, and Hermione's parents are in 
the ultimate middle-class profession. Yet these people are perfectly 
acceptable. 

Ultimately, JKR accepts that there are social inequalities, but uses 
Sirius (GoF, Ch 27) to inform us of her views: "If you want to know 
what a man's like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, 
not his equals".

> What about the books' attitude towards Squibs? Do we find Filch 
> more or less sympathetic when we discover this about him?

I don't know about "sympathetic", but he certainly comes across as 
more pathetic (in the true sense of the word), and we can perhaps 
understand his motives. But ultimately, it just proves that he's out 
for a kind of revenge in his own way, which sentiment isn't portrayed 
as a "good thing" throughout the books.

> 3. Is Hogwarts an elitist institution? Does its resemblance to 
Eton, with 
> its cliquish houses, weird sports, funny uniforms and symbolic, 
> honor-based competitions replicate the elitist values of the 
British 
> Empire, critique them, or even satirize them?

Not at all. I think that JKR's invention of Hogwarts is functional 
rather than anything else. After all, Harry has to be able to escape 
to the wizarding community from the Dursleys for an extended period, 
though with the prospect of return always on the horizon. Also, he 
needs to be able to have his adventures with only limited adult 
input/interference, and mainly on his terms. This means a boarding 
school. 

The uniforms aren't "funny" in the slightest - uniforms are a fact of 
life in British education (state schools as well), and of course as 
these are wizards, they have robes rather than blazers and ties (an 
element not followed by the film-that-must-not-be-named which really 
grated on me). The houses are another fact of life of boarding 
schools and also serve a plot device to allow certain freiendships 
and animosities to develop. 

As for the "weird sports", Quidditch isn't strange at all - it's the 
main sport of the worldwide wizarding community and it's only natural 
that it would be played at Hogwarts. Soccer, rugby or cricket would 
simply be too *boring*.

I don't therefore think that there's any deliberate satirizing or 
critique of boarding school education implicit in the books at all. 
On the contrary, I see a kind of grudging respect... 

Hogwarts is a *good* school, and the only criterion for entry is 
merit. Malfoy the aristocrat, the Weasleys the empoverished civil 
servant's family, and even Ernie the milkman's son all have equal 
rights to be there. Interestingly as well, they are very much a mixed-
race bunch, with whites, Orientals, Indians and blacks in attendance. 

> 4. Is Harry a member of the elite, even among Wizards? In which 
ways is he 
> privileged by birth, inheritance, exceptional 'natural' talent or 
special 
> treatment from powerful benefactors?

Of course Harry's a member of the "best of the best". He's the 
hero. :-)

More seriously though, you present a series of very loaded questions 
there. Harry's main privilege, which he prefers to see as something 
of a curse, is the weight of expectation. After all, he is The Boy 
Who Lived. Therefore, there *has* to be something special about him, 
doesn't there? (or at least, so the entire Magical community would 
think). Harry's main problem is trying to live as normal life as he 
can with all that weight on his shoulders.  As a result, he receives 
special treatment from Dumbledore (who knows more about *WHY* Harry 
is TBWL than we do or he does!) but at the same time, is the subject 
of Snape's ridicule for exactly the same reasons.

Harry has proved himself to be academically no more than average; his 
magical skills are sometimes wanting - he needs Hermione's and Ron's 
help with his Spelling (*groan*) :-) on several occasions. His only 
real natural talent is flying, which he has inherited from his 
father, which in itself isn't unusual. 

Personally, I'd have preferred him not to have been rich, but this 
was needed as a double plot device: to distinguish his existence in 
the magical world from the Muggle one, and to show that he is capable 
of using his riches (fairly) wisely. He appreciates, for instance, 
that he can't spend his fortune on a single broomstick. 

On balance, though, I wouldn't consider Harry to be 
particularly "privileged".

> 5. Is there an inconsistency in the way that the books treat the 
> problem of Blood vs. Choice? 
<snip>
> How do we resolve these contradictions, or can we?

Of course we can't. Again, it's a fact of nature and an accident of 
birth. JKR underlines that we are NOT born equal, but should 
nevertheless strive to treat each other as if we were. Our blood 
(both literally and metaphorically) makes some of us superior to 
others in some ways, but not in others. Our choices determine the 
balance. We cannot be held accountable for having been born poor or 
untalented; we can, however, be held accountable for what we choose 
to do with what we have.

This is one of the primary reasons why I'm a proponent of the 
Redeemable!Draco scenario. If Malfoy is to survive the series as a 
brat, it will have to be in circumstances in which he deliberately 
refuses redemption, the same way in which Harry refused to be enticed 
by corruption during their first meeting.

> 6. How do the books explicitly explore the problem of bigotry and
> elitism?
<snip>
> Do the books' genuine attempts at criticizing elitism confront or 
> ironicize the  ways that they also support elitism? Or do the 
> books' progressive views simply clash with their conservative ones?

I think the "moral" thus far is mainly that we are *all* prejudiced 
in our own way. Either for social or personal reasons, we all 
rationalise our fears and hatreds to some extent. I don't think 
there's any kind of clash between elitism and egalitarianism - 
ultimately, JKR recognises that one is a fact of life and the other 
is a function of our ability to be open to understand and accept 
those who are different from ourselves. As an extreme example, whilst 
fighting for elf rights, Hermione is oblivious to their own needs and 
isn't prepared to understand *their* social prejudices. It comes down 
to individual aspirations and needs, not social ones.

> 7. The Wizarding World is downright antiquated in many ways. For 
> one thing, the books' have a suspicion towards newfangled 
> technology: we are meant to look down on Dudley for his video games 
> and multiple TV sets, and to find charming the fact that Wizard 
> technology seems to be modeled on that of early 20th century 
> Muggles (trains, quill pens, communication by post, etc.). But the 
> WW also adheres to an old-fashioned set of values: 
> Wizards embody the Warrior Ethos with its 'death-before-dishonor' 
> idealism and they embrace adult responsibilities such as marriage, 
> parenthood and career as early as their late teens. Do you agree 
> with Richard Adams that the WW's resemblance to Great Britain at 
> the height of its Empire align it 
> with the bad old days? Is it at odds with the books' explicitly 
> progressive attitudes in other areas?

I think Adams is reading a little too much into it. JKR is, by her 
own admission, a technophobe. She also loves steam trains. It is 
therefore not unusual for her to infuse her ideal(ised) world with 
those ideas. 

'Death before dishonour' is one of the oldest values in storytelling, 
and *especially* heroic stories, and it would be strange for this 
element *not* to shine through the Potterverse. Given the rather old-
fashioned nature of the WW and the potential power of a single wizard 
with a wand, it follows quite naturally that this should be the case.

(as an aisde: considering the otherwise Victorian nature of almost 
everything in the WW, how does the wizarding wireless work without 
electricity? :-) Reception is easy, but transmission is just a little 
more difficult...)

-- 
GulPlum AKA Richard, UK