I heard someone on the radio the other day decrying the lack of working class people in the media. Surely, being in the media automatically makes you middle class by default, regardless of your background (unless you're Lord Clark of Civilization) - or is social mobility dead and buried? I hear many so-called 'working class' accents on the radio and TV these days.
Often, but certainly not always, you need a degree to work in the media too - there's no bar to working class people getting a degree, more and more are doing so and, if education is an attribute of class, a degree again makes you middle class.
Julie Birchill is a name that immediately springs to mind as an example of someone with a working class background and no degree, but who has become a media star and middle class, although she probably wouldn't like the label. Music seems to be a good route into the media for the working class, as is being a writer, whether of books or plays.
That's not to say things can't be improved, but it's patently false to maintain there are no working class people in the media, as the item I heard was implying. I suppose it all depends on one's definition of working class...
Often, but certainly not always, you need a degree to work in the media too - there's no bar to working class people getting a degree, more and more are doing so and, if education is an attribute of class, a degree again makes you middle class.
Julie Birchill is a name that immediately springs to mind as an example of someone with a working class background and no degree, but who has become a media star and middle class, although she probably wouldn't like the label. Music seems to be a good route into the media for the working class, as is being a writer, whether of books or plays.
That's not to say things can't be improved, but it's patently false to maintain there are no working class people in the media, as the item I heard was implying. I suppose it all depends on one's definition of working class...
Analyse and discuss.
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