Elite (pronounced ay-leet (U) or e-leet (non-U))
(1) The
choice or best of anything considered collectively, as of a group or class of
persons (often used with a plural verb).
(2)
Historically, persons of the highest class (used with a plural verb). Once associated mostly with high birth or
social position (the aristocratic or patrician), it’s now a much applied and
contested concept.
(3) A
group of persons exercising the major share of authority or influence within a
larger group.
(4) A
typeface, approximately 10-point in printing-type size, widely used in
typewriters and having 12 characters to the inch and now included in many
digital font sets.
(5) Representing
the most choice or select; best; of, relating to, or suitable for an elite;
exclusive
1350–1400: From the Middle English (in the sense of "a person elected to office"), from the Middle French e(s)lit (chosen), feminine past participle of e(s)lisre & e(s)lire (to choose), from the Latin ēligere (to elect), the past participle electus; the source of the modern elect, election & related forms. Variations are created as required such as anti-elite, global-elite, non-elite, power-elite & super-elite. Words in a similar sense include exclusive, silk-stocking, aristocracy, celebrity, establishment, society, choice, cool, crack, elect, noble, pick, super, top, best, cream & gentility. The alternative spelling is the French élite and use of the French pronunciation the "U" ay-leet rather than the "non-U" e-leet is one of the "class-identifiers" on which readers of publications like Country Life focus when meeting folk.
Use in
English became more frequent after 1823 in the sense of "a choice or
select body, the best part".
Earlier, in fourteenth century Middle English it had been borrowed from
French with the meaning "chosen person" (and was used much in ecclesiastical
documents to describe a bishop-elect) but had died out by the middle of the
next century. Elite was re-introduced to
general use when it appeared by in Lord Byron's (1788-1824) epic poem Don Juan (1819-1824); it caught on and was by 1852 an adjective. The noun elitism (advocacy of or preference
for rule or social domination by an elite element in a system or society;
attitude or behavior of persons who are or deem themselves among the elite)
dates from 1951 and is an early example of the development of the language of
critical theory which emerged, encouraged by the vast increase in the social
sciences in the expanded universities of the post-war years.
Introduced in 1961, the IBM Selectric (a portmanteau of select(ive) + (elect)ric)) was a landmark of modern industrial design and the last major advance in desktop document production before the word processor. Built to the high standard for which IBM was once renowned, it allowed users to change font sets within seconds, simply by swapping the "element" which everybody except IBM staff (always in blue suits and white shirts) called "golf balls". At the time the concept of a swappable character set was actually decades old and systems using flat, rotating "wheels" were the usual alternative approach but the Selectric did it best and in the 1960s there was still a enticing allure to the IBM name. The most popular of the early fonts were Elite, Gothic & Courier (all available in several variations. The first Elite typeface was released in 1920 and used by both typewriters and hot metal typesetting. Prestige Elite (usually referred to as “Prestige” or “Elite”), was a monospaced typeface, created in 1953 for IBM and among the most popular of those available for the Selectric. Optimized for the particular technology of the typewriter, Prestige Elite was characterized by the large x-height and moderate stroke thickness suitable for ribbon-based impact printing. Unlike the similar Courier, the Elite sets did not transition to the digital age although TrueType, PostScript and other formats of variations of Elite are commercially available.
The
rise in use of the adjective elitist (advocating or preferring rule or social
domination by an elite element in a system or society; deeming oneself to be
among the elite) is noted from the same era, the original adjectival examples including
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900), and Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881). The nous
use quickly followed although some dictionaries insist it’s not attested until
1961. The concept attracted much
attention from sociologists exploring structures of power and the relationships
between them, much discussed in Michael Young’s (1915-2002) The Rise of the Meritocracy (1958)
although, while intended as a critique of a society increasingly divided
between a skilled power-holding elite and a disenfranchised underclass of the
less qualified, meritocracy, to the author’s disquiet, meritocracy (and meritocratic)
evolved into a word with at least neutral and often positive connotations.
Charles
Wright Mills (1916–1962 and usually styled C Wright Mills) was an American
sociologist who published the much criticized but also influential The Power Elite (1956) which appears to
have introduced the term to political criticism. Mills took a structuralist approach and
explored the clusters of elites and how their relationships and interactions
works to enable them to exert (whether overtly or organically) an essentially
dictatorial control over US society and its economy. Mills, while acknowledging some overlap
between the groups, identified six clusters of elites: (1) those who ran the
large corporations, (2) those who owned the corporations, (3) popular culture
celebrities including the news media, (4) the upper-strata of wealth-owning
families, (5) the military establishment (centred on the Pentagon’s Joint
Chiefs of Staff) and (6), the upper echelons of government (the executives, the
legislatures the judges, the senior bureaucracy and the duopoly of the two
established political parties. The
overlaps he noted did not in any way diminish the value of his description,
instead illustrating its operation.
Although
criticized as being more a left-wing polemic than conventional academic
research (something from which Mills really didn’t demur), The Power Elite aged well and influenced many, the famous caution
President Eisenhower (1890–1969; president of the US 1953-1961) issued in his
valedictory address warning of the “military-industrial complex” was quite
Millsian and a helpful contribution to the library of structuralism. Generations of sociologists and others would
develop his idea of the new and shifting construct of a ruling class and
culture. In recent years, elite has become a term used (usually between elites) as an accusation; elite populists finding their base responsive to the label being applied to those of whom they're anyway most suspicious: journalists, scientists, academics etc.
The Lotus Elite
The design of the Lotus Elite (Type 14, 1957-1963) was a catalogue of innovation, some of which would have an immediate effect on the industry though some would proved too difficult to implement in mass-production and, except for the most expensive, impossible profitably to pursue on a smaller scale. Most distinctive was a technique borrowed from aviation, the stressed-skin glass-fibre unibody which obviated entirely the need for a chassis or space-frame, the body an integrated, load-bearing structure. The only substantial steel components were a sub-frame supporting the engine and front suspension and a hoop to which was attached the windscreen, door hinges and jacking points. In an indication of how much things have changed, the hoop was the extent of passenger protection.
Even had all the components been produced in accordance with the specification, many parts of the structure were so close to the point of failure that some revisions to the design would anyway have been necessary but the early cars were far from perfect. The contact for the fabrication of the bodies had been won by a boat-builder, then one of the few companies with much experience in molding fibreglass. However, the Elite was a more complex design than a boat hull and fibreglass was still a novel material, even Chevrolet in the United States, with access to the financial and engineering resources of General Motors, found early in the production of the Corvette there were lessons still to be learned. After the first 250-odd were built, Lotus became aware there were problems, the need for a fix urgent. Cleverly, the body consisted of three stressed-fiberglass layers which, when joined in a monocoque, created the bulkheads and eight torsion boxes gave the structure its strength and stiffness although the success was something of a surprise. The designer, working in the pre-CAD era and with no experience of the behavior of fibreglass, had doubted the material would be strong enough so had the first prototype built with some steel and aluminum plates sandwiched between the layers with mounting brackets bonded in points at the rear to support the suspension and differential mountings. In subsequent tests, these proved unnecessary but so poorly molded were many of the layers that structural failures became common, the resin porings of inconsistent thickness creating weaknesses at critical points, suspension struts and differentials known to punch themselves loose from mountings or even tear away chunks of the supposedly supporting fibreglass.
Needing an operation more acquainted with the tight tolerances demanded in precision engineering, Lotus switched suppliers, the molding contract granted to the Bristol Aeroplane Company. This transformed quality control and the remaining 750-odd Elites carried an S2 designation, the early cars retrospectively (but unofficially) dubbed S1. Even so, despite the improved, lighter and stiffer shell, it would be another generation before the structural implications of fibreglass would fully be understood and the flaws inherent in the design remained, suspension attachment points sometimes still prone to detachment, Lotus content to the extent it now happened only under extreme loading rather than habitually.
Improbably, the power-plant was the 1.2 litre Coventry Climax FWE (Fire-Water-Elite), an all-aluminum inline four cylinder engine which began life as the FWA (feather weight automotive), derived from a water-pumping unit for the UK Government’s fleet of fire-trucks but, small, light and robust, when tuned, it proved ideally suited to motorsport. The first derivative for competition was the FWB, the unexpected fork prompting Coventry-Climax to rename to versions still used on fire-trucks to FWP (P=Pump). The FWE was produced especially for the Elite but its qualities attracted a number of specialist race-car builders and in historic racing, the little powerhouse remains competitive to this day.
The combination of light-weight, a surprisingly powerful engine and a degree of aerodynamic efficiency which few for decades would match delivered a package with a then unrivalled combination of performance and economy. On the road, point-to-point, it was able to maintain high average speeds under most conditions and only in then unusual places like the German autobahns with their unlimited speeds could heavier, more powerful machines assert their advantage.
On the circuits, it enjoyed an illustrious career, notable especially for success in long-distance events at the Nürburgring and Le Mans. The frugal fuel consumption was an important factor too, as well as claiming five class trophies in the Le Mans 24 hour race, the Elite twice won the mysterious Indice de performance (an index of thermal efficiency), a curious piece of mathematics actually designed to ensure, regardless of other results, a French car would always win something.
One problem however was never solved: profitability. It was something which would plague the UK’s low-volume manufacturers throughout the 1960s, for, whatever the design and engineering prowess available, there was often a lack of financial acumen and accounting skills, many companies never fully evolving from their cottage-industry origins in a back shed, their administrative structures still close to the family business they had once been. Whether Lotus lost quite as much per Elite as the legend suggests isn’t known but it certainly wasn’t profitable. Those lessons were learned and the replacement, while less intriguing a design, would be easier to build, more reliable in operation and, compared to the Elite, mass-produced. The replacement was called the Elan.
The Elite name was reprised. Between 1974-1982, the Elite (Types 75 & 83) was one of a number of the then fashionable wedge-shaped designs which would litter the decade. Effectively replacing the Elan +2, the new Elite was big and heavy by earlier standards, its performance in some aspects inferior to the Elan but it was a difficult era and many manufacturers with more resources did worse. Later variations of this were called the Eclat and Excel but, like much of what was done in the 1970s, none are remembered with great fondness.
More promising was the Elite Concept, shown in 2010. Hardly original, and actually derivative in just about every way, it nevertheless tantalized all with a specification list including Toyota’s fine 5.0 litre Lexus V8 but any hope of a production version vanished after one of the many corporate restructures undertaken in the wake of the global financial crisis (GFC, 2009-2011).
