Chattering Classes
Chattering Classes ( English , German roughly "gossip circles") is an anti-intellectual , pejorative political catchphrase in the Anglo-American language area to denote members of the educated left-liberal middle class. According to Webster's New World College Dictionary , “chattering classes” refer to intellectuals , writers and media professionals who, as a group, are believed to have argued liberally on political and social issues .
The term was established in Great Britain in the 1980s. Conservative British journalist Frank Johnson is said to have been the first to use them, according to the Daily Telegraph .
The political scientist Eva Kreisky writes about Margaret Thatcher : "In the chattering classes at universities, in the field of art, in public administration and in critical journalism, she sensed the political opponents she detested."
Web links
- Joe Moran: The myth of the chattering classes was the product of a Thatcherite populism that aimed to short-circuit traditional elites, speaking directly to "ordinary people" , New Statesman Essay, New Statesman , October 24, 2005; Retrieved August 24, 2011
Individual evidence
- ↑ Larousse: Dictionary English-German, entry “chattering classes” . Editions Larousse. Archived from the original on December 31, 2013. Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved August 2, 2011.
- ↑ Webster's New World College Dictionary, Wiley Publishing Inc. 2010, online , accessed July 26, 2011.
- ↑ Elizabeth Knowles: The Oxford Dictionary of Phrase and Fable 2006, online , accessed July 26, 2011
- ^ Obituary to Frank Johnson , telegraph.co.uk, accessed July 26, 2011
- ↑ Eva Kreisky: Intellectuals as historical model , p. 48. In: dies. (Ed.): On the power of minds: intellectuals between modern and late modern , WUV Universitätsverlag, Vienna 2000, pp. 11–66, ISBN 3-85114-544-5 , online , accessed on July 26, 2011
