Things I Dont Want To Know 
Respectable: Crossing the Class Divide
£9.99
We talk a lot about the role class plays in British society, but how exactly do we move from one ‘class’ to another – and, if we can do so, what effect does it have on us? In this book, part memoir, part social analysis, Lynsey Hanley explains that to be ‘respectable’ is to be neither rough nor posh, neither rich nor especially poor. Drawing on her own experience growing up in Birmingham – living through the Thatcher years, listening to the Pet Shop Boys and Erasure, reading her parents’ ‘Daily Mirror’ and her grandparents’ ‘Sun’ – Hanley shows how social mobility can be double-edged unless we recognise the psychological impact of class and its creation of self-limiting obstacles.
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‘Pithy and provoking, spiced with the personal’ Hilary Mantel
Lynsey Hanley grew up part of the ‘respectable working class’. At university, she discovered that social mobility is not all it seems. This book is about what it means to cross class divides, what we leave behind in order to get on, and how class affects all of us today.
‘There is fury contained within the pages and between the lines of Respectable … intelligent and important’ Colin Grant, Guardian
‘Honest, brave and moving’ Kate Pickett, co-author of The Spirit Level
‘Lynsey Hanley is such a crucial voice. When she writes about class, she is writing about lived experience’ Owen Jones, New Statesman
‘Hanley vividly describes the “risky, lonely journey” she undertook from one class to another … She is tremendous at detailing her personal transition’ Craig Brown, Mail on Sunday
| Weight | 0.191 kg |
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| Dimensions | 19.8 × 12.9 × 1.5 cm |
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| Cover | Paperback |
| Pages | xiv, 240 |
| Language | English |
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| Dewey | 305.50941 (edition:23) |
| Readership | College – higher education / Code: F |
