Downton Abbey Sorce

Downton Abbey 

Before War... 

None of the female caharacters worked. 

The upper class just looked after the estate did not do any labour. 

Different Classes were not allowed to marry one another. 

All the workers did everything downstairs(upstairs downstairs) was how seperate they were. 

Womens opinions didn't matter to the people there were no workers in london who were middle class women. 

It was frowned upon to get married to people from other countries (americans) 

The seperate classes would not speak to each other as friends. 

Women should not drive themselves if upper class.

After.. 

Women had to be forced into taking some of the mens roles in thier work while they were in war and so after they just continued to be like these as shown ( nurses, journalists) 

They married different classes after working together. 

The men had to get stuck into manual labour for filling all the gaps in roles. 

women become journalists thier points are valued more by others.
Women get tought to drive as they have to get themselves around.


http://workingclassstudies.wordpress.com/2013/01/22/upstairs-downstairs-downton-what-downton-abbey-can-tell-us-about-class-in-america-today/

In season two of Downton Abbey, the inimical Dame Maggie Smith (who plays the “Dowager Countess”) finds out that one of the family’s servants will be allowed to live out his final days (after suffering an incurable war wound) in the family’s lavish second floor quarters. The Countess is displeased by this and opines that “It always happens when you give these little people power, it goes to their heads like strong drink.”

If you are a fan of the show, one of the 7.9 million US viewers who watchedDownton Abbey kick off its third season on PBS earlier this month, you know full well that the “little people” in this early 20^th century British world—the kitchen maids, ladies’ maids, footmen, valets, chauffeurs, cooks, housekeepers, and butlers—have very little power. They scheme and scrap for the merest improvements in pay and job title. A few of them rise above their station, but class divisions are brutally enforced, and if anyone seems deluded with power by “strong drink,” it is the titled and wealthy upstairs residents who are served an impressive array of wines and spirits on a nightly basis.

I am a fan of the show, transfixed by the class differences represented in the series which tries very hard—from the dialogue, the sumptuous costumes, and the setting—to be about another time and place. But is it? Let’s look at a few of the myths that swirl around Downton Abbey and consider what we can learn about the real history behind the show— and about ourselves.