Absolutely. As I have said (belabored?) here before, social class is the great taboo of American society and because of that we often confuse issues of class with issues of race.

Hmm, very likely true.

The author mentioned in the piece, Ken Oldfield, is a friend of mine. I just finished attending the Working-Class*Poverty- Class Academics conference, so I got to see him and the rest of the members. There were excellent presentations! Many of them were about considering class in admissions, talking about class in media, and making elite institutions more friendly for poor folk.

Sounds very interesting. Was this a conference by academics from working-class backgrounds or middle class academics talking about class issues?

Yes, it (WCPCA) started as a listserv in 1994. It has always focused on the experience of being bi-classed and surviving elite academia as a poor person...most of agree this is an incredibly painful experience. We also do research on understanding the relationship of class to all aspects of society.