Social class

Social class describes the relationships between people in hierarchical societies or cultures. While anthropologists, historians and sociologists identify class as a social structure emerging from pre-history, the idea of social class entered the English lexicon about the 1770s. Social classes with more power usually subordinate classes with less power. Social classes with a great deal of power are usually viewed as an elite, at least by their own societies.

See also

• lumpenproletariat, proletariat, bourgeoisie, working class, middle class, intelligentsia
• elitism
• proletarianization
• folk culture
• politics, sociology
• Class conflict
• Class in the contemporary United States
• Classlessness
• Market segment, Population segment
• nobility
• slavery
• Social exclusion
• subculture