‘Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class’ reviewed by Sheryl Bernadette Buckley


Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class

Verso, London and New York, 2011. 304pp., £14.99 pb
ISBN 9781844676965

About the reviewer

Sheryl Bernadette Buckley is a final-year PhD student at the University of Salford. Her thesis …

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The term `chav’ is one of the most deeply rooted insults in the English language. Popularised by modern culture, media and even the Oxford English Dictionary, most people are at least aware, if not personally familiar, with somebody who they believe fits the chav label. Mocking the chav through examples such as the Vicky Pollard character in ‘Little Britain,’ or those in ‘Shameless,’ the ‘Jeremy Kyle Show,’ or the late Jade Goody, demonstrates that the concept of chav runs throughout the popular media. Owen Jones’s Chavs provides a relevant and informed account of how the term has become embedded in English culture. It considers the causes and wider political and social implications of the term, and addresses the main question of how the ‘salt of the earth’ has become the ‘scum of the earth.’

Jones begins with an anecdote about a dinner party at which he was present. One of the guests pondered where chavs would buy their Christmas presents following the closure of Woolworths – a humorous way of introducing the popular image of the topic of the book. The introduction also sets out the rather strange case of Gymbox, the expensive fitness suite that introduced hugely popular classes such as ‘Chav Fighting,’ and which managed to pass the scrutiny of even the Advertising Standards Agency. (3) Alongside this Jones introduces his main argument, that the term `chav’ is a misrepresentation of the working class, a class that in fact is often unable to work due to the policies of successive Government. These policies, evident since Thatcherism, have stripped them of their jobs, their council houses and their patronising reputation as the ‘salt of the earth.’ The Introduction also sets the scene for the rest of the book in that this image of the working class is contrasted with that of the affluent middle class, particularly those in politics, media and the law who control society. The society that they structure, aruges Jones, is not meritocratic as they claim; it serves to suck the working class’s means of survival and identity from it and then berate it with the chav stereotype for the condition in which it is left. This core argument is substantiated by many interesting examples. However, the first half of the book sets this out adequately and the remainder is spent adding further evidence.

Jones is interested in the role of the media in creating the image of the working class as abhorrent, a view perpetuated by those in the higher echelons of society. A particularly relevant case, with which most readers will be familiar, is that of Shannon Matthews and Madeleine McCann – the two little girls who disappeared in 2008 and 2007 respectively. This example is especially effective in highlighting the class perceptions endemic in British society. Matthews, from a Dewsbury council estate, and McCann, the child of two doctors, both attracted much media attention; however, both the media perception and reward money were vastly different. (14) When Matthews was found, and it transpired that her own mother had kidnapped her to pocket the reward money, the whole Dewsbury community faced the wrath of the establishment, the Matthews family themselves seemingly a microcosm of the immorality of the whole estate. For Jones this example demonstrates how far removed those who make the decisions in society are from this world, yet how the overwhelmingly middle class media still felt able to make judgements about Dewsbury and the alleged chavs that populate it. Their stories ignored the fact that many of Dewsbury’s generally poor residents had given up time and money to help find the little girl. The contrast with the media treatment of the middle class McCanns could not have been greater.

The potted historical evolution of the chav is also an important and interesting element to the book. The attack on the working class by Thatcher ensured that council houses were sold, leaving only the poorest in them, and effectively turning these remnants into the sink estates which the middle class media are so quick to criticise. Thatcherism and its economic policies demolished industries such as steel, coal and manufacturing, privatising anything that remained. This not only created unemployment for the working class but also destroyed the community cohesion that such industries had created. Entire communities, often based around the local pit or factory, were wiped out. Without new jobs or the generation-based deference built into such industries, these areas quickly became hotbeds of unemployment, crime and, increasingly, the chav. This historical account provides evidence for Jones’s main argument, that government policies and decisions imposed on the working class have deprived it of its fundamental class characteristics, and left it adrift and open to vilification from those who in fact created these conditions.

It is in the context of employment that Jones considers the impact of Britain’s move from being primarily an industrial nation to being a service economy. Jones asks why, as the econcomic basis of the nation changed, those who found themselves employed in shops and call centres instead of industry, failed to become active in trade unions. The partial answer lies in the nature of the work that the working class are often forced to engage in. For example, Jones’s interview with one call centre worker (147) reveals a Dickensian situation in which the work is isolated, regimented and computerised. Further exploration would have been good here. Jones firmly rejects the assertion that ‘we’re all middle class now,’ pointing out the lineage of the politicians, lawyers and media moguls, and the improbability of many members of the working class getting a foothold in these professions due to their mandatory unpaid internships. The contrast between the jobs that the middle class do and the jobs that the working class do is not new, however the social and economic changes that the working classes have faced since the 1979 general election are. For Jones these changes have deprived the working class of its identity, left it without the means to support itself, and led to the chav stereotype.

The idea that the middle class cannot empathise with, let alone pass judgement on, the working class increasingly becomes the focus of the book, supported by various often entertaining examples. Jones also continually makes the point that it is impossible to know what it is like to be working class as a middle class person. Only on page 174 does he reveal details of his own background: his middle class upbringing in Stockport, a relatively leafy suburb of Manchester, as the child of a University lecturer and a council officer, who goes on to read History at Oxford. While there is no need to be overly judgmental about Jones’s personal history, if middle class people cannot make judgements about the working class, it is salient to ask whether Jones is well placed to do this, even if he is arguing in their defence?

Chavs is an entertaining read mixing contemporary social and political issues with anecdotal, popular examples that are often humorous enough to appeal to a popular and non-academic audience. The punches of the book are landed in the early stages and the remainder serves to substantiate its arguments and observations. Reading it leaves one in no doubt that Britain is as class-ridden as ever.

3 July 2012

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