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    English missing

    insults that relate to one's social class

    Subject

    insults that relate to one's social class

    Sources
    I do a paper about curses and insults that relate to a social class. What are insults for lower and upper class people?

    For example: "Snout", "whippersnapper" and "snob" for upper class people or "chav" for lower class people.

    What do you think
    AuthorBen20 Sep 10, 15:12
    Comment
    Off the top of my head— Val / Trixie / Yuppie / Redneck... are the ones I can think of and that do not have a racial or religious or ancestral implications...
    #1Author Sage N. Fer Get K.S.C. (382314) 20 Sep 10, 15:50
    Comment
    Somewhat OT: whippersnapper is considered an insult ?
    Am I understanding the question correctly? Because whippersnapper is just used by someone who is very old for someone young. It does not refer to social class.

    Or, do you mean that whippersnapper is only used by the upperclass?

    Edit: snob and chav definitely refer to social class, and I've never heard snout used as an insult before, but including whippersnapper has me thrown off...
    #2Author Lara Chu (AmE) (236716) 20 Sep 10, 15:57
    Comment
    she is a gold digger

    gold digging skank tramp
    #3Author...20 Sep 10, 16:03
    Comment
    I don't find "snob" these days so exclusively upper class-related as perhaps it once was. The contemporary middle classes are full of snobs.
    #4AuthorPhillipp20 Sep 10, 16:11
    Suggestionclass insults below
    Sources
    trailer trash: low-income usually white people living in trailer homes.

    cracker: Term for poor white people

    new money: Oh the Jones, they're new money. A derogatory term used by old rich families to denote people who have only recently become wealthy.

    redneck/hill billy: Red neck is more general, but hill billy are the poor families living in the mountain regions in the east like West Virginia. They are often teased for being inbred, etc.

    I'm from the US, but I don't know what a "Val" (or is Valley Girl meant?)
    or a "Trixie" would be.



    #5Authorarianamaniacs (US)20 Sep 10, 16:23
    Comment
    Does cracker imply poverty? I didn't think so...

    Yes, like, you know, I totally meant "Valley Girl"... :-)
    And I thought a Trixie was also some kind of young and superficial thinks-she-is-sooo-hot drama queen.. like a female jock. And there we go—another one.
    #6Author Sage N. Fer Get K.S.C. (382314) 20 Sep 10, 16:48
    Comment
    Thanks a lot for your help.

    I may add that it will be an etymological paper, so it does not matter if the term can still be used nowadays. Snob, for example, was used exclusively for upper class people but now it can refer to many other people which behave arrogant as well. The goal of the paper will be an analysis of the metaphorical background of those insults. As we can see, we have the expected money-metaphor (new-money, gold-digger) on the one hand but several others on the other hand, for example the fact that poor people seem to have been considered dumb (hill billy, redneck, val). Thanks again for your thoughts, those are the words I chose so far.

    chav, snob, new-money, gold digger, val, hill billy, redneck, (yuppie, not an insult), trailer trash, cracker, skank tramp.

    in a (pretty old) slang dictionary I found those:

    fuckface, bugger, snot, phlegm and catarrh. I never heard any of those, what do you think?
    #7AuthorBen22 Sep 10, 16:26
    Comment
    I should do some research on UD.
    www.urbandictionary.com
    #8Authorwondersoftheinternet22 Sep 10, 16:32
    Comment
    @#7: I wouldn't want to be called any of those, but they don't sound like class-related insults to me.

    Oh, and I agree with Lara about the whippersnapper. That's just something like "Jungspund", isn't it?

    Edit: "val" or "valley girl" might be considered dumb, but I didn't know they were also poor ("poor people seem to have been considered dumb )
    #9Author Dragon (238202) 22 Sep 10, 16:33
    Comment
    oik, pleb, non-U, U, nouveau-riche, common, nob, Hooray (Henry), Sloane (Ranger)
    #10AuthorKinkyAfro (587241) 22 Sep 10, 17:50
     
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