Is the DR more or less classist than the United States?

[linamia]

Originally Posted by Criss Colon

They were "Low Class", "WE" are "High Class" and thier vote doesn't count here!
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Who is "We"?

[NALs]

Originally Posted by Tordok

I'm having eerily vivid flashbacks of my own experience from your example, HB. ..... all so typical of the old guard bourgeois in Santiago.

"Cual es tu apellido mijo,.... y el de tú mamá?" Tu estás emparentado con Don Fulano, el dueño de Tal y Tal, C por A.?" "Tu abuelo era muy amigo de mi tío..." yadda, yadda, yadda....

That crapola does take me back to my own youth when befriended some of my wealthy local classmates or even dared to ask on dates some of the "niñas-bien" of some of those very same old families you mentioned. I guess my special charms won them over despite my unorthodox beliefs and my alien status*, but going to any private party at a local rich folk's home meant being interviewed by one of the aunts or grandmothers at some point during the event, all the while the young people -my new "friends"- would exaggerate or emebellish my pedigree for me so that I would be acceptable to their matrons. Ridiculous, but "when in Rome.......

- Tordok

* anyone not from Santiago is considered to be "de fuera" among their upper crust.

Well,

Santiago is Santiago.

Sometimes they forget that there is more to this country than Santiago and the Cibao, but who cares....

We all know that at the end of the day, it's Santo Domingo that makes the decisions and Santiago has to go along whether they like it or not!

Aah, the Santiago-Santo Domingo rivalry, its really something....

But, Tordok is right on the mark. Last names, whose who, where you are from, etc is very important in upper crust Santiago society especially. There is a reason why they are called Tutompoles.

-NAL

[NALs]

Originally Posted by Hillbilly

Interesting.

This weekend I had an experience that sort of points out what one of the posters referred to: Money don't make class.

As I went out to pick up the morning papers, I found the beautiful box from a bottle of Johnny Walker Green Label....there in the street.

My first thought was "What kind of a person would have the money to spend +/-RD$3500 for a bottle of good whiskey and then lack the brains to know that you shouldn't throw the empty out onto the street?"

I asked this of my corner "bodeguero" aand he answered:"HB, that person doesn't work." Which to me meant that it was some sort of hoodlum class person....sort of what I felt initially.

Class in the DR: Think back....You went to your girl/boy friend's house. You met her grandmother. What was the first thing out of the dear old lady's mouth?
"¿De quién es usted, mi hij@?"

She wanted to know who and where you were from. She wanted to know what "quality" you were from, too.

Part of living here, I suppose.

As an answer: Yes there is. But it can be porous, if the climber has any couth at all. For example, in Santiago, all the old families have disappeared from 'view' ....The Bermúdez, the Cabrals, the Espaillats, the Tavárez...are still there, but they are no longer the spokespersons for the local scene.
All of the new people have come up by dint of intelligence, education and hard work. 40 years ago there was just the Chamber of Commerce and Industry as a platform.
Now there is the Association of Merchants and Industrialists, the Association of Industrialists North Region, The Associaton for the Development of Santiago all of which serve as platforms for opinion and for forging opinions.
None of the above are headed by any of the old families....

HB

HB,

This is the european/spanish influence that is still lingering here. I hear than in England (and this is not exclusive to England, btw), people are more interested from where the parents of a person are from than the person him/herself. Even if a person is born in England, people are more interested in knowing where the parents came and if the parents were foreigners, the kid would be considered a foreigner as well, despite being born in England.

Apprently, being English means having English roots all the way.

To respond to the post, I will simply repost what I posted in another thread:

In this region of the world (Caribbean and Brazil), a person (regardless of race, color, or blood lines) can gain access to upper crust society if he/she acquires a good education, some money, some culture or class and the such.

This is not true of other societies in the rest of the hemisphere or the world, where once you are born in a particular class, it does not matter what you do, you will never enter the upper classes. This is true of England, where even the richest of the rich will not be considered upper class if he was not born into one of those few families. Also, in the US, being part of a race is connected with certain stereotypes which are connected to blood lines and previous perceptions. Once you are born into one, you will not come out until death.

Here, improve your lot by improving yourself and soon you will notice that blood lines, race, and class are not more important than that.

The exeption comes among the tutumpoles, where ancestry is very important but you will be surprised how open they become when the person is not of "respectable ancestry" but has a good class, education, and wealth belt around his/her waist.

So yes, Classism is alive and well here and often enough, social status (which is connected to class) is more important than anything else.

This also explains why so many people here focus so much on their public image as well.

BTW: Many foreigners (not just DR1 foreigners, but all sorts of foreigners) fail to differentiate racism from classism and often make comments complaining of racial discrimination when in fact, its simply classism in action.

This is why when you date or are about to marry someone, you will almost always get the questions:

What's the surname of your fiance?

If they don't recognize the surname, they will ask about your fiance's profession, who their parents were, what they did, etc.

Usually, if they don't recongnize that either, they will ask from where they are from and this one usually gives them the answers they are looking for.

Where you live in town says everything in terms of class, social status, and the such.

A recent "revelation" to me came recently, where I heard that this attitude even exist among the lower classes, though I don't know if it does for the same reason.

Apparently, when someone marries another person among the lower classes here, usually people commnent "fulano married so and so, the daughter of xyz from La Vega" and depending on the reputation the parents have, people would either approve or disapprove from such union.

This is interesting, because it points to, perhaps, subclasses between the lower class as well. The more I learn about this, the more I will post because its interesting.

All this time I thought only the upper classes practiced this, only to realize that it exist at all levels of Dominican and perhaps, Caribbean societies.

-NAL

[Tordok]

Originally Posted by Nal0whs

All this time I thought only the upper classes practiced this, only to realize that it exist at all levels of Dominican and perhaps, Caribbean societies. -NAL

Hey Nal,
I think that pretty much all Dominicans pay serious attention to the social provenance of their new acquaintances. It is more noticeable among upper classes in many contexts, but in the specific context of future spouses etc, I think everyone in every culture wants to find out about who's aspiring to form family with their girl/boy.

Keep in mind that historically in virtually all cultures, marriage was until very recently a transaction between families and not much consideration given to any actual romantic interests of the couple.

I've always heard the word as 'Tutumpotes' , but I belive it does derive from "Totem Pole". Totem poles of course are very tall, ceremonial wooden structures with various carved figures, one on top of the next used by some of the Native tribal peoples of the Pacific Northwest (US/Canada). The ones at the entrance of the Royal Ontario museum in Toronto are the most impressive example that I've personally seen. In Dominican lingo, tutumpotes/tutumpoles are members of the old ruling families, because they have always been on top of the 'social totem pole'.

- Tordok

[NALs]

Originally Posted by Tordok

Hey Nal,
I think that pretty much all Dominicans pay serious attention to the social provenance of their new acquaintances. It is more noticeable among upper classes in many contexts, but in the specific context of future spouses etc, I think everyone in every culture wants to find out about who's aspiring to form family with their girl/boy.

Keep in mind that historically in virtually all cultures, marriage was until very recently a transaction between families and not much consideration given to any actual romantic interests of the couple.

I'm aware of this, but its still interesting to learn of the extent lower class Dominicans go through in this respect.

I thought they were less interested towards this type of issue, because of the constant mixing of all sorts among the lower classes. One would think that they all looked at each other as one and the same class, it appears that the lower class is subdivided into other subclasses that may be unknown to those who are not part of the lower classes altogether and perhaps, even to intellectuals who specialize in sociology and Dominican culture.

As for what are the conditions for categorizing one person into one subclass as oppose to another class within the lower class itself, I have no concrete idea.

I would assume that moving within those subclasses is based more on physical attributes than personal improvements, due to the fact that most people in the lower classes don't have much access to quality education or formal credit which leads to increase wealth when one takes good loans, though most lower class people take plenty of bad loans due to their economic circumstances and their unwillingness to take risks.

EXTRA: For those of you reading this and don't know what I mean by good or bad loan, here is the meaning:

Good loan: Money you borrow to leverage your investments. In this case, you take a loan, invest the money in some business or do some form of arbitrage, and then payback the loan with interest while keeping the remaining gain as personal profits. In fact, this is the only way of amassing large sums of money, in one lifetime anyways, while putting little to no capital of your own.

Bad loan: Money you borrow to buy things that lose value. In this case, you take a loan, buy something, and then you have to find the money to pay back the principal and the interest to the lender. In the end, you end up with nothing, except a devalued good or service that can only be sold for less than what you paid, sometimes the good or service (particularly a service) can't be resold.

Originally Posted by Tordok

I've always heard the word as 'Tutumpotes' , but I belive it does derive from "Totem Pole". Totem poles of course are very tall, ceremonial wooden structures with various carved figures, one on top of the next used by some of the Native tribal peoples of the Pacific Northwest (US/Canada). The ones at the entrance of the Royal Ontario museum in Toronto are the most impressive example that I've personally seen. In Dominican lingo, tutumpotes/tutumpoles are members of the old ruling families, because they have always been on top of the 'social totem pole'.

- Tordok

'Tutumpotes' is how I have always heard the word as well, but I must have misspelled the word in english.

Anyways, the fact that the 'tutumpotes' have always been on top of the social totem pole greatly influences their above average preocupation with ancestry, though ancestry is a preocupation shared by all peoples of this country regardless of social position.

-NAL

[RHM]

Ah yes the Totem Pole. It reminds me of the Gilligan's Island episode where Gilligan and the Skipper discovered an ancient Cupecoy Headhunters pole and the figure on top looked just like Gilligan. Then all the castaways were taken hostage by the Cupecoy and Gilligan had to pretend to be the ghost of the ancient leader in order to scare off the headhunters and free the rest of the crew.

Oh yeah. That was a good episode.

Scandall

[Mirador]

'Tutumpotes' was a term coined by the late Juan Bosch, during his campaign for the short lived presidency of 1963. By 'tutumpotes' he meant the rich, the big land and business owners, as opposed to the poor which he referred to as 'los hijos de machepa'.

[mondongo]

Originally Posted by Chirimoya

IMO, true class means you feel comfortable enough not to have to flaunt your wealth via status symbols. .

chiri, your acuity on display again. The fact is that there is little "class" in the DR. everyone flaunts. the poor just can't do it as frequently and as ostentatiously as the rich. the very richest stay out of the limelight....mainly for self-preservation.

[RHM]

Originally Posted by mondongo

chiri, your acuity on display again. The fact is that there is little "class" in the DR. everyone flaunts. the poor just can't do it as frequently and as ostentatiously as the rich. the very richest stay out of the limelight....mainly for self-preservation.

I agree. I know Dominicans from the mid to lower parts of the socio-economic spectrum who have more class than the so called "upper" class. Having money does not mean you have courtesy and respect for others.

Scandall

[Exxtol]

Originally Posted by Scandall

Having money does not mean you have courtesy and respect for others.
Scandall

Of course not. When you're rich you can afford to treat people like $%#!