Official Philip Nel Question #10: Class

[GulPlum]

No: HPFGUIDX 41412

Sorry, I probably can't do Elkins' post (or my own thoughts) justice -
 it's a bit late, but there are a few things I feel I have to say.

Elkins wrote:

(major snippages throughout, or I'd be here forever; I've also cut 
out all your references to Christie; I can't stomach her style or her 
plots and having read only a couple of her books, I don't consider 
myself qualified to comment)

> I see strong ambivalence here as well, and I agree with Porphyria's 
> implication that most of the internal contradictions of the Harry 
> Potter books cluster around the core concept of *elitism* -- 
elitism 
> based on class, on race, on heritage, on "blood," on ability, and 
> even on a certain type of social confomism, of "normalcy."  If the 
> tensions created by internal thematic contradiction and authorial 
> ambivalence may be read as the "fault lines" of a text, then 
elitism 
> is this particular text's epicenter.  It is the ground zero, the 
> point from which the vast majority of shakings and rumblings of 
> reader discontent and reader resistance seem to emanate.  

I don't actually agree with that analysis. I am perhaps splitting 
hairs, but I don't see the books' epicentre as being "elitism" per 
se, but prejudice. Elitism is all about hierarchical structure and 
one's place in it. I don't see the Potterverse (or JKR) revolving 
around that, but around the concept of accepting what we don't 
understand or what is different from us. Not necessarily *inferior*, 
but *different*. Of course, prejudice usually rears its ugly head by 
inferring that one is inherently better than others, but in this 
sense, "elitism" is but a symptom, not the root cause.

What I find interesting is that the *only* character we've met in the 
four books to date who has not displayed any kind of prejudice is the 
character set up as the arbiter of good and evil, our moral compass 
and the ultimate wise person: Dumbledore. He's not willing to condemn 
anyone, on any level, without full knowledge of the facts, and is 
always willing to re-appraise his views if he discovers that his 
grasp of the facts is incomplete. Everyone is due respect, and 
everyone is due a chance (or even two chances) to prove themselves. 
He is always willing to find good in people, whatever their faults 
and whatever their social standing. 

For me, this is the most telling aspect of the stories, and it is in 
this respect that our hero most wants to emulate his mentor. Both 
Dumbledore and Harry are "elitist" in the sense that only the best 
will do, and that everyone should give the best of themselves. But 
neither of them believes that anyone has a right to a social position 
above anyone else. 

Strangely enough, though, both of them recognise that social 
inequality exists, and Harry himself represents both extremes in one 
person: he is very much of the "elite" in the sense that he is 
considered powerful for reasons he himself does not understand, as 
The Boy Who Lived. He is the "elite" in that his parents were 
independently wealthy. He is the "elite" because he has found a place 
at the best School of Wizardry in the world.  He is the "elite" 
because he is the protegé of the acknowledged single most powerful 
wizard in the world. 

At the same time, he is anything but of the social elite. He is an 
orphan, has spent his young years in drudgery (whilst witnessing a 
world of plenty on a daily basis). He is small and physically weak, 
and is constantly bullied. Before he took up his rightful place 
(which is only a temporary escape as he must return to his place at 
the bottom of the ladder each year) he had no prospects at all.

Despite all of this, Harry remains classless in both worlds. His 
social standing will be what he makes of it, not a place which has 
been pre-determined for him.

> Arriviste and insecure in their place in the social hierarchy the 
> Dursleys may be, 
> but they nonetheless stand firmly aligned with the values and the 
> prejudices of the more jingoistic and backwards-looking segments of 
> the conservative English middle class.

You say that as if there weren't equally voluble elements of the 
prolatariat (to use a hopefully unemotive term) which espouse 
*exactly* the same values. In today's Britain, I suspect that those 
views are far more those of the aspiring classes rather than the true 
middle class. An example I've used previously in this discussion: 
aspiring to a holiday home in Majorca is NOT, by any stretch of the 
imagination, a middle class ambition.

If anything, the social element JKR is escoriating are those people 
who have delusions of being middle class while not understanding the 
first thing about that actually means. 

> Although JKR lambasts the conservative middle class through her 
> depiction of the Dursleys, her writing itself nonetheless 
promulgates 
> many of this group's particular social values, mores and 
judgements, 
> particularly when it comes to their view of the social classes 
above 
> and below their own.  

To be perfectly honest, I'd find anything else rather strange, as JKR 
is the epitome of the modern middle-class British person. Her 
upbringing was solidly middle-class but from what we can glimpse of 
her political views, they are quite liberal (in the US sense of the 
word), which again is pretty typical of her class.

JKR has no experience of council block inner-city life, and probably 
wouldn't be able to write about it. Slightly patronsing some of her 
middle-class values might appear to be (a responsibility to "look 
after those less fortunate than oneself", a certain fascination with 
pets and other animals, etc), but they are perfectly valid concerns 
to have. 

The fact of the matter is that social inequalities exist and there is 
no way they can be asolished. The best we can do is to help to blur 
the lines, to make climbging the ladder easier for those who deserve 
it. The Durselys most definitely do not.

> Lower eschelon Ministry workers are a 
> part of the magic circle.  Even clerks may well be included.  But 
> people like Stan and Ernie, or the lunch trolley witch, or the 
> shopkeepers of Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley are not.  The working 
> classes are simply not encompassed by the vision of the series as a 
> whole.  

Again, I'm sorry, but I don't find that in the slightest bit strange. 
Harry (and we) see a limited part of the world, both Muggle and 
magical. We see a little bit of a typical commuter-belt well-to-do 
English village. We then see what's considered the best wizarding 
school in the world. Of course the people we meet aren't going to be 
working class. We are only going to meet traders, artisans or 
other "working class" people incidentally. In fact, as boarding 
school stories go, we probably meet more positive "working class" 
people in the Potterverse than in any other. 

Harry doesn't mix with adults, he mixes with his school peers, 
whether in the Muggle or wizard worlds. Adults are either in a 
position of authority or simply doing a job. 

The thing, though, is that people *from* "working class" backgrounds 
are equally valid in the Potterverse. I agree with you that Harry's 
schoolmates from such a background are figures of fun (Seamus, 
Neville), but then so is the mega-middle-class Ernie who-was-going-to-
go-to-Eton, in his own way. At Hogwarts, even both Creevey brothers, 
the milkman's (one of the ultimate working class stereotypes) sons, 
are allowed to shine.  

> Only Muggle-born students, who are obviously a special case, 
> have parents who do not come from the middle classes or above.  

To be fair, we know the social standing of few of Harry's pure-blood 
peers' families.  It's simply unfair to draw conclusions from such a 
small sample. The Malfoys are landed gentry and the Weasleys are a 
civil servant and a housewife. We also know that Neville's parents 
were something akin to police officers. Also, Arthur, despite having 
a middle class job, has none of the middle class values which we are 
encouraged to despise. 

> Indeed, there are things in the text itself which strongly suggest 
> that Hogwarts is *not* in fact, as JKR has stated in interview, the 
> only wizarding school in Great Britain.  Hermione refers to it as 
> the "best" school of its kind.  Neville talks about his family's 
> relief that he has been deemed "magical enough for Hogwarts" as a 
> separate issue than their earlier joy at his proving himself to be 
> capable of magic at all.

Even if it isn't the only school in Britain, I'm not sure what the 
point is that you're trying to make. The fact remains that enrolment 
is based on merit, not social standing.

> The result of this discrepancy between what the author says and 
what 
> she writes is to further the impression of ambivalence, even of a 
> certain degree of dishonesty.  The books simply do not deal with 
the 
> lower classes.  They fall outside of their purview and outside of 
> their scope.  The social range that does fall within the attention 
of 
> the text is a far narrower one: it generally encompasses only the 
> respectable (if sometimes impoverished) middle classes and above.

What about the elves? Whilst not part of the wizarding community, 
these are magical "people" (I use that word deliberately) who are 
very much the underclass and a significant proportion of GoF is given 
over to their social needs and their view of their place in society. 

> The country squire 
> is admired and respected; the upper ranks of the aristocracy, on 
the 
> other hand, are viewed with the gravest of suspicion.  Peers are 
> dubious people: unsavory, suspect, Not To Be Trusted.  They have 
> perverse tastes and shadowy interests.  They are inbred.  They are 
> unwholesome.  And they're not even really English at all, you 
know.  
> They're *foreigners.*  Continentals.  Dare we even say that they 
> are...French?

I didn't know Malfoy had been raised to the peerage. :-) 

> This is damning indeed, because within the strangely conservative 
> middle class world view which really does often seem to me to be 
> informing these books, good people are above all else *English* -- 
or 
> perhaps, as this *is* JKR, we ought to say "British?" ;-)

(BTW, JKR herself being quintessentially English, despite her current 
sojourn north of the Border, represents, I agree, Englishness, not 
Britishness). 

I'm not sure I agree. Bad people are just as English/British. Quirrel 
& Snape aren't positive characters; Krum, whilst having been under 
suspiscion, is not evil; Madame Maxime and Fleur are no more 
prejudiced in their own way than the other characters, but are 
otherwise fine people. So the Malfoys are toadies and Pettigrew's 
spineless (?), but then so are Crabbe and Goyle. Even the 
quintessentially un-English black Dean Thomas has never put a foot 
wrong (though as I've said in recent speculation about him, I'm sure 
we have a lot to learn!).

Even the very English Tom Riddle is outwardly Head Boy and recipient 
of an Award for Services to Hogwarts, though he's rotten to the core. 
Of course, when he becomes the embodiment of evil, he takes on a 
French name, though, which perhaps gives a little bit of support to 
your theory. But is the author's prejudice, or the character's?

> On some fundamental level, we simply do not *believe* in the 
Dursleys 
> in at all the same way that we believe in the rest of the fictive 
> world.  

I agree that the Dursleys' world is a caricature and isn't drawn 
anywhere as well as the magical world. However, we must remember that 
the Muggle world is the real world we inhabit. JKR isn't going to 
waste her time and ours describing what we all know. Besides, Harry's 
inhabitation of our world just doesn't work on so many levels and so 
the cartoon nature of the Dursleys and their world sticks out by a 
mile. 

> The explicit condemnation of their values doesn't carry the 
> same weight as the implicit approval that these same values are 
> granted by the rest of the text -- in very much the same way that 
> JKR's use of stereotypes as a form of humor so often fails to 
> quite convince readers that she really doesn't, deep down in her 
> heart of hearts, genuinely believe the things that she passes off 
> as "nothing but a joke."  

I must admit that your rationale (which I cut out) failed to convince 
me in the slightest that JKR is espousing these values in the 
slightest. Returning to my main point desribed at great length above, 
the wizarding world is as riddled with prejudice as ours. But I don't 
see JKR supporting any of those prejudices in any way.  

I might return to a detailed analysis of some of your rationale when 
I have more time (and when I'm more awake than I am right now... It's 
almost half past five in the morning, and WELL past my bed time!). 
I'm sure that in the time I've been writing this, other people have 
already made valid points...

-- 
GulPlum AKA Richard, UK