Word: upper-class
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Enter a plucky upper-class Englishman. In the days before the sun set on the British Empire, his ancestors might have rattled a few sabers and issued an edict in the name of the Queen. But Robin Hanbury-Tenison, 42, re-established order in a subtler way. After studying the troubled tribesmen, he launched a program to teach them fishing and chicken and pig farming. That helped restore their self-sufficiency and, equally important, their selfesteem...
Whenever they traveled, wrote Dudman, "we sought an answer to the central question being asked by much of the outside world: What has happened to the middle-and upper-class city dwellers since the Communist takeover? Repeated interrogation produced no clear answer to the question of 'auto-genocide,' the term used by some critics for an alleged methodical execution of much of the entire class of former professionals, tradesmen, civil servants and soldiers. There were indications in both directions. The Cambodian revolution evidently has forced [those city dwellers] to conform to an austere standard of hard manual labor...
Most of the upper-class law students will take one course five days a week during January and an exam at the end of the month...
Children of the upper class generally seem to show less respect to their elders than the offspring of the upwardly mobile. The hulking, mouth-breathing surliness of adolescence knows no social distinctions, of course. But the upper-class child, while able to engage easily in small talk that won't bore his elders, rarely says "Yes, sir" or "Yes, ma'am" when talking to his parents' friends. The custom still applies in those provinces of the middle class where authoritarianism has not fallen into disrepute...
Nowhere is that more evident than in the dorms. The first look at the group bathrooms and cell-like rooms drives some adults to the nearest Holiday Inn. Most stay, however, and take advantage of the upper-class "parent-advisers," who are there to answer questions. "As long as I know he washes his face and hangs up his clothes, maybe I can relax," confides the mother of an only child. Indeed, the parents quiz the advisers closely about food, how roommate conflicts are resolved and whether refrigerators are allowed...