CHAPTER 12 - THE ASSIGNED AND PROFESSED SOCIAL CLASSES

Abstract

This chapter discusses the ways in which factors external to the university context and those within it operate in students' social relations. The chapter discusses some of the components of the student's status-set as it relates to both internal and external membership and reference groups. The students in Edinburgh University, Durham University, and Newcastle University were asked on the questionnaire what factor they believe to be the most important in society at large in determining an individual's social status and class position. The students were also asked what they understood by social class and what kind of person they would put into each social class. The student's ranking of his parents' social class is termed the professed social class as opposed to the assigned social class accorded by the researcher. The chapter presents a comparison of assigned and professed social class to explain certain features of social mobility which are central to “mobility experience.” This makes it possible to see what the student thinks he is moving from and to and at what particular times in his life is mobility likely to occur.