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Who Let YOU In Here? Social Class, Sitcoms and The New Normal

DePasquale, Diana
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1351617412

Abstract Details

2012, Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, American Culture Studies/Communication.
An example of social class stratification in sitcoms can be seen when a working-class character attempts to gain entry to an upper-class social environment, a formal dinner party, or an environment signified to read higher class - the opera, a museum, a fancy expensive restaurant - and they reveal their working-class status by their failure to assimilate. They use the wrong fork to eat the salad, they talk loudly in the audience during a performance, or, more frequently, they use visual and physical humor to convey how their bodies do not belong in the upper-class space. The working-class character’s clothes do not fit - a tuxedo too baggy or too tight - an awkward attempt to extend a pinky while sipping a cocktail, the adoption of a fancy walk, an affected accent to feign “breeding” or mispronunciation of a word to reveal a lack of “breeding”, or some other behavior that is supposed to inform the audience that this person is trying to fit in, but failing at doing so. The message is clear; some people just don’t belong and they should know their place. An example of this would be a restaurant maître d' who sneeringly informs the working-class character that a reservation is required, or jackets must be worn by gentlemen dining in the restaurant. In most sitcoms, there is an upper-class character who tries to maintain the segregation of the upper-class environment by denying access to the working-class character. It is worthy of mention that frequently this character is also working-class - the maître d' or another type of support staff character who gains access to an upper-class environment by serving the upper-class occupants. These characters are not actually included in the upper class, but they are allowed entry to the environment as they help to enforce the boundaries which maintain the segregation between upper and working classes, thereby facilitating and maintaining hegemony. These working-class characters differ from the excluded working-class in that they recognize a rigid distinction between the classes and even though they are not officially included into working class, they are allowed adjacent access, as long as they observe and enforce the class boundaries. In doing so, they demonstrate to the upper-class that they are willing to exclude members of their own social class in order to be granted entry - if only as a servant - to an environment in which they do not belong. This character also interrupts the myth of the American Dream and social mobility by demonstrating to both upper and working-class characters that there are ways to circumvent class stratification, albeit in a voyeuristic way - by excluding other working-class characters from this environment. Is the audience laughing at the failure of working-class characters to move out of their social class and ascend to middle or upper class, or are they laughing at the semiotics of the boundaries that exclude working-class characters from being allowed entry into upper-class environments? Probably both, as the boundaries work to reify the ideology that class status on television is usually static, (with a few notable but problematic exceptions) and the working-class character, by failing to realize this, makes a fool of himself by attempting to become upwardly mobile and fails to do so.
Ellen Berry, Ph.D. (Advisor)
Robert Sloane (Committee Member)
79 p.
American Studies
television; social class; sitcoms; 30 rock; it's always sunny in philadelphia; 2 broke girls; the new normal; recession; representation

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • DePasquale, D. (2012). Who Let YOU In Here? Social Class, Sitcoms and The New Normal [Master's thesis, Bowling Green State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1351617412

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • DePasquale, Diana. Who Let YOU In Here? Social Class, Sitcoms and The New Normal. 2012. Bowling Green State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1351617412.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • DePasquale, Diana. "Who Let YOU In Here? Social Class, Sitcoms and The New Normal." Master's thesis, Bowling Green State University, 2012. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1351617412

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

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© 2012, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Bowling Green State University and OhioLINK.