Social Class and Cultural Consumption: The Impact of Modernisation in a Comparative European Perspective

Abstract

Pierre Bourdieu's work bas argued that there is a homology of social classes on tbe one hand and cultural consumption on the other. In contrast, theories of individualisation posit that social class plays only a minor role in shaping lifestyle in contemporary societies. In this paper we examine a) how much contemporary highbrow lifestyles in 27 European countries are structured by class membership, b) the extent to which highbrow consumption varies according to the level of modernisation of a society and c) whether the explanatory power of social class in relation to highbrow consumption decreases in more modernised European countries. The findings show that highbrow lifestyles are strongly influenced hy social class, and that highbrow consumption is more common in more modernised societies. Moreover, the findings confirm tbe hypothesis that the formative power of social class on lifestyle decreases in highly modernised societies, albeit without disappearing completely.

La terciarización en Chile. Desigualdad cultural y estructura ocupacional

“…Sin embargo, no existe consenso acerca de si efectivamente estamos en presencia de una transformación Una dimensión adicional en el campo de estudios de las clases medias a nivel global es la que se refiere al ámbito cultural, entendido este como patrones de gusto y participación cultural, que en la investigación sociológica de las últimas tres décadas se ha abordado desde una matriz fundamentalmente bourdieuana (Bourdieu, 1979). En estos estudios, la clase media no solo se define a partir de sus ocupaciones, niveles educativos o de ingresos, sino que es caracterizada como un grupo social culturalmente activo o con una notable propensión a tener una actividad cultural intensa (Bennett y otros, 2009;Bennett, Bustamente y Frow, 2013;Gerhards, Hans y Mutz, 2013;Roberts, 2004). Junto con este activismo relativo a las prácticas de alta cultura, algunos autores sostienen que en dicho activismo se incluirían prácticas culturales más masivas, lo que podría implicar un debilitamiento de las fronteras simbólicas de clase, motivado por la creciente adopción por parte de sus miembros de prácticas culturales habitualmente consideradas más próximas a los hábitos y gustos de sectores más populares (Peterson y Kern, 1996).…”

“…Al respecto, en lugar de optar por una clasificación de clase particular (Gerhards, Hans y Mutz, 2013), donde de antemano se proponen agrupaciones ocupacionales que tienen que ver con otros estudios, en este trabajo se adopta una perspectiva bourdieuana, según la cual las agrupaciones ocupacionales son un producto inductivo como resultado del estudio anterior de las similitudes entre individuos derivadas del comportamiento cultural. En otros términos, aquí la contribución a una evaluación del estado actual de la sociedad chilena pasa necesariamente por el estudio de los patrones culturales, y la ocupación vendría posteriormente como una expresión de los complejos anclajes estructurales a los que aquellos están sujetos (Pinto, 2013).…”

Cultural Consumption and Musical Preferences of Youth: Development of Typology in the Case of Zadar

“…Brojna istraživanja kulturnih preferencija, osobito ona koja su se oslanjala na teoriju homologije, uglavnom su se fokusirala na razlike između tzv. profinjenog (highbrow) i priprostog (lowbrow) ukusa (DiMaggio, 1987;Katz-Gerro, 2002;Gerhards, Hans i Mutz, 2013) upućujući pritom na povezanost visokog društvenog statusa i sklonosti prema potrošnji kulturnih proizvoda visoke simboličke vrijednosti. S druge strane, istraživači koji su kulturnoj potrošnji pristupali iz motrišta teorije individualizacije ili u kontekstu rasprava o kulturnim omnivorima i univorima, zauzimali su kritičniji stav spram distinkcije »profinjenog« i »priprostog« ukusa, nastojeći obuhvatiti što širi raspon kulturnih praksi i ukusa (Katz-Gerro, 2004;García-Álvarez, Katz-Gerro i López-Sintas, 2007;Zavisca, 2005;Tampubolon, 2010).…”

Tertiarization in Chile: Cultural inequality and occupational structure

“…An additional dimension in the global study of the middle classes is the cultural sphere, understood as patterns of cultural participation and taste, with sociological research in this area having been undertaken within an essentially Bourdieusian framework over the last three decades (Bourdieu, 1979). In these studies, the middle class is not just defined by its occupations or its education or income levels, but is characterized as a social group that is culturally active or has a particular propensity towards intense cultural activity (Bennett and others, 2009;Bennett, Bustamente and Frow, 2013;Gerhards, Hans and Mutz, 2013;Roberts, 2004). Some authors argue that this class is active not only in high culture but in mass culture too, which could imply a weakening of symbolic class boundaries as a result of its members' growing adoption of cultural practices usually considered closer to the habits and tastes of lower-class sectors (Peterson and Kern, 1996).…”

“…The present paper, instead of opting for a particular class classification (Gerhards, Hans and Mutz, 2013) based on occupational groupings that draw on other studies from the outset, adopts a Bourdieusian perspective whereby such groupings arise inductively from the analysis of similarities between individuals as derived from their cultural behaviour. In other words, the contribution of this study to the evaluation of the current state of Chilean society necessarily involves an examination of cultural patterns, with occupation coming later as a manifestation of the complex structural ties to which these are subject (Pinto, 2013).…”