The document discusses how different television shows represent social class through their characters. In The Inbetweeners, the main character Will is from a higher class than the other boys and is bullied for it. Skins portrays mostly middle to lower class families through their living situations and behaviors like smoking and drinking. Hollyoaks shows both wealthy families like the Roy family and poorer families like the McQueens.

2. The majority of characters in The Inbetweeners, are a low or middle class, the newest student, Will, is high class, and in The Inbetweeners, he is represented as a much higher class than anyone else. Will is very new to the type of society in the school, and he is negatively treated because of his difference. The other lower class characters are represented as a much lower class through, speech, actions and mannerisms. Even the teachers who would expect to act as a higher class to gain authority over students are the same or even worse than the students and treat will as a “posh”, “big headed”, higher class student when Will is only being polite and following the rules of his up bringing.

3. In South Park, the characters are from a varied set of classes, and are treated as such, an incredibly low class family, such as the Kenny’s family, causes extreme bullying. Token however is from a very high class family and he also is bullied, or at least treated differently because of it. The rest of the cast is of a similar class, all own their own homes or belong to one if a child. In The Simpsons, the characters are from a varied set of classes, but it’s not shown as much as in South Park. The Simpsons are probably middle class as homer is a working man. Although The Flanders’ family are also middle class, we may see them as a higher class compared to the Simpsons as we normally see Homer doing things to copy Flanders’ or try and be better then him.

4. Hollyoaks and Skins In Hollyoaks like other TV dramas there are many different families which are said to be in different classes. The main class that the families are categorised in, in Hollyoaks are in the middle class, as they are mainly working class families; there are a few families which may be seen as high class though. An example of a high class family is ‘The Roy family’. On the other hand the families in skins are mainly seen to be middle or low class. The settings showing where the families live help us to identify what class they are. The dull dark dirty setting of skins that we sometimes witness allows us to identify it being a low class programme. Also the smoking, drug taking and getting drunk helps us see the characters are low class and have nothing better to spend their money on.

5. An example of a low class family in Skins is Effy Stonems’ Family, her mother has different boyfriends every week and her mum doesn’t work, just sits at home smoking all day (that’s what we witness her doing anyway). As I mentioned in skins we see a lot of smoking, drinking and drug taking; this is present as the young teenagers do it in a way to get attention from their parents especially Effy; her mum is only interested in herself and her boyfriends. http:// www.youtube.com/watch?v =ImHhsc80fro The Clip above shows a brief outline of Effy Stonems’ life. The Smokey effect over the top of the images allows us to think that smoking is part of the families life. It shows her mum just ignores her and she has to go out and get drunk or do something she regrets to get attention, we see this when her mum is washing her hair in the bath at the end and Effy is upset about something but she has won attention from her mum. Skins

6. The Roy family in Hollyoaks are a wealthy, well spoken family. They live in a big well kept house with the parents working hard and earning for the family. The mother is a beautician and even thought doesn’t earn much for the family enjoys her job and keeps herself looking nice. The father is the head teacher of ‘Hollyoaks High school’ so has quite a good income. The children of the family have all been brought up well and look after each other, they are well educated and don’t get into trouble; well not as much as the characters do in Skins. http:// www.youtube.com/watch?v =2lsVpvF7gkA The clip above shows the Roy children opening up their new business. They are doing it to prove to their parents they can look after themselves this shows us the audience that even as they are growing up they are still getting treated like children and need to follow the rules. Hollyoaks

7. In modern family, the majority of the cast are middle class; they are home owners, seem to be doing fairly well and can be labelled as average families within their environment. Some characters such as Jay can be classified as high class as he is known for being rich, or at least having a lot more money than the other characters, he has also married a much younger, beautiful woman which is associated with high class older males. Also Cameron, can be classed as a lower class, probably because of the past, he grew up in a lower class family and in opposition, Mitchell, being brought up in a high class of family and is rather stuck up. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5uuMr1YEyE

8. Mitchell and Slater families The Mitchell family is seen in Eastenders as a middle/high class family. They are probably middle class but in Eastenders compared to the other families we would say they are high class. They own many places such as; Walford Snooker Hall, Bridge Street Cafe, The Arches and most importantly they own the Queen Vic. The Mitchell family are a well known family in the square and a lot of the important big storylines are based around them. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7E1Vk6KfAE The Slater family are a middle class family but compared to the Mitchells’ they are probably a lower class. They are a ‘common’ family and always are associated with bad, twisted storylines. They own a market stall on Albert Square which shows us they are a lower class then the Mitchells who own a pub. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qgUf9hlTnnU This is the most popular and remembered Slater storyline.

9. A low class family in Hollyoaks is the McQueens. They are a big family with most of the children having different fathers who they don’t see. They dress ‘slutty’ and attract all the boys; attracting a lot of men and boys creates problems for them as they are always arguing with men or with each other over men. The McQueen girls are stereotyped for low class through how they look, dress and act. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEuXILLkdK0 An example of their relationships and how they get on with each other are shown on the clip above.

10. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pJhL-A8XyE&feature=player_embedded As you can see from the video just watched two of the families we saw are both social/working class families, we also may say they are low class. The house doesn’t look very big or modern and the parents are arguing about money. You wouldn’t expect the shouting and bad language from a posh high class family that you heard at the beginning of the video. We see the father at work, he works on a building site, this also adds to the impression of a low class family as he would be getting a fairly low income.

11. There is a very clear division between the different classes in Period Dramas for us to see. Class is shown in period dramas through the Mise en scene; this includes: costume, lighting, colour and props. Costume is the biggest part of the mise en scene in period dramas; we can see straight away what class they are in from what they are wearing.