ABSTRACT
One of the features that catches one's attention during fieldwork is the scarcity of categorizations ordinarily used in the community which would signal people's situation and status in society. In the pre-war period such categorizations were precise to the point of caste-like rigidity; for example, a man might describe himself as small peasant and the extent of his material assets, social status and rank, his exact position in relation to all other strata and his life-style, would all be contained. The lack of popular agreement as to what social categories exist in contemporary Hungarian society, and how they are placed in relation to one another, is a noteworthy feature that deserves mention. The most research programme on social stratification in Hungary concludes that social and material advantages and disadvantages are not evenly distributed throughout Hungarian society. The results of statistical macro-studies are very different from social differentiation observable in everyday community life.
