Re: Boy's middle name for a girl---edit
in reply to a message by queenv
Especially among New Englanders in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, class wouldn't have been determined by money alone. Andrew Borden's lineage would have been more important.
I mean, look at impoverished aristocrats throughout Europe. They were surely still the upper classes, just without money. This is how it is where I'm from. Old name = upper class. Money, made on one's own or not, has little to do with it if you have an old name. However, if you don't have a prestigious lineage, and then you make lots of money, people around my hometown will call you nouveau riche.
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I mean, look at impoverished aristocrats throughout Europe. They were surely still the upper classes, just without money. This is how it is where I'm from. Old name = upper class. Money, made on one's own or not, has little to do with it if you have an old name. However, if you don't have a prestigious lineage, and then you make lots of money, people around my hometown will call you nouveau riche.
This message was edited 7/18/2014, 11:25 AM
Replies
So, would someone with an old name and no money get more respect/admiration than someone who made their own money?
Maybe not respect or admiration, but envy or a little bit of awe. But maybe from those people who respect others based on their class, yes.
This is why if I were ever to make lots of money, I'd never refer to myself above middle class.
This is why if I were ever to make lots of money, I'd never refer to myself above middle class.
I know we've had this discussion before, but that's the opposite of the way things are here. People would be more in awe of a person who came from nothing and worked themselves up to a higher tax bracket than a poor person with a family name. The family name person would be interesting, but it wouldn't be awe inspiring.