I have already said (p. 222) that ranking differences in the village do not produce social classes, but rather pyramids in which vertical relations of sociability are as easy as horizontal ones. Ranking differences in the towns on the other hand, inibit vertical relationships of sociability.
This difference in quality between rural and urban stratification, is, I think, at least partly responsible for a phenomenon commonly remarked by foreign observers, and spoken of with pride by the Turks themselves. Villagers often conduct themselves with remarkable dignity and self-respect, and are outspoken in the presence of important people. These egalitarian manners are said to prove an absence of social class, or class consciousness. This is a false conclusion. Such behaviour is typical only of a minority of vocal village leaders: the majority are respectful, silent and unnoticed before their urban betters. In fact, Turkish society is almost military in its hierarchy. But to the villager social intercourse and hierarchy are not mutually exclusive, because in the pyramidical structure of the village, hierarchy is not the social barrier it is in the towns.
In spite of this widespread impression of egalitarianism, the general inferiority of the village to town profoundly affects relations between town and village. The villager, even the man who is pre-eminent in his own village and proud of his urbanity and connections, is in fact ignorant beside his urban kinsman. Most village leaders were not literate in 1950, at any rate not in the new Latin script. Thus, while town and village may meet for a large number of purposes, official business, temporary urban employment, visits of kinsmen to the village, and so on, they