Sloane Ranger - The Official Sloane Ranger Handbook

Sloane Ranger, a commonplace term in 1980s London, was originally popularised by British writer Peter York and co-writer Ann Barr in The Official Sloane Ranger Handbook (1982) and its companion The Official Sloane Ranger Diary. The books were published by the British society-watcher magazine Harpers & Queen, for whom Peter York was Style Editor and "was responsible for identifying the cult phenomena of "Sloane Rangers" and "Foodies".

The exemplar female Sloane Ranger was considered to be Lady Diana Spencer before marrying The Prince of Wales, when she was an aristocrat from the Spencer family. However, most Sloanes were not aristocrats as Lady Diana was. Considered typical of SRs was patriotism and traditionalism, and a belief in the values of upper-class and upper-middle-class culture, confidence in themselves and their given places in the world, a fondness for life in the countryside, country sports in particular, philistinism and anti-intellectualism. The title of the Sloane Ranger handbook lists the subheading "the problem of Hampstead", in reference to the stereotypical Sloane Ranger's supposed antipathy to the champagne socialist stereotype of the Hampstead liberal.

However, not all 1980s Sloanes liked country sports — Diana herself hated them, and not all were philistine anti-intellectuals. The reason why a proud philistinism is emphasised is twofold: SRs, with their SR-based self-confidence were supposedly unembarrassed to admit disliking ballet, opera, modern art, and James Joyce; most public intellectuals of the 1970s and the 1980s were left-wing, hence aligning with left-wing intelligentsia cultural values would be anathematic to staunchly Tory Sloanes. The typical male Sloane is satirised by the Harry Enfield character, Tim Nice-but-Dim.

Accent noticeably identified and separated the Sloane Ranger from the non-Sloane. Sloanes would share the same general accent traits whether they came from London, the Home Counties, Scotland, other parts of Britain, or even if educated abroad. Sloanes might use the same language as middle-class non-Sloanes, but would speak with a region-neutral accent and received pronunciation.