C is and will (probably) always be a high level language by definition. That it's categorized as a lower level high level language than say Python or Ruby does not magically make it a low level language. There are low level languages which map mnemonics to instruction sets and high level languages that provide an abstraction over having to use the former and are more akin to the written word. That hasn't changed just because we have "higher level high level languages" these days.

Langauge itself is a highly variable thing. People can understand something completely different from what the originator intended, but it doesn't change what said originator meant by it. People can always say "oh C is not a high level language because I think that a low level language should be X and Y" the same way they can say "oh men have to have a beard and know how to fight to be be real men", but in reality men - beards or not - are still fundamentally men.