Suchergebnisse

"How does cultural hierarchy relate to social hierarchy? Do the more advantaged consume 'high' culture, while the less advantaged consume popular culture? Or has cultural consumption in contemporary societies become individualised to such a degree that there is no longer any social basis for cultural consumption? Leading scholars from the UK, the USA, Chile, France, Hungary and the Netherlands systematically examine the social stratification of arts and culture. They evaluate the 'class--culture homology argument' of Pierre Bourdieu and Herbert Gans; the 'individualisation arguments' of Anthony Giddens, Ulrich Beck and Zygmunt Bauman; and the 'omnivore--univore argument' of Richard Peterson. They also demonstrate that, consistent with Max Weber's class--status distinction, cultural consumption, as a key element of lifestyle, is stratified primarily on the basis of social status rather than by social class."--Provided by publisher

This book offers critical reflection on Pierre Bourdieu's account of the relationships between class, culture, power and taste. It compares and contrasts different theoretical and conceptual approaches, and brings empirical investigations to bear on relevant theoretical issues about social distinction. This book was published as a special issue of Journal of Cultural Economy.

The objective of this article is to explain visits to arts institutions by merging two theoretical perspectives that are generally regarded as antithetical, the model of the human being as homo sociologicus, and the model of the human being as homo oeconomicus. This article demonstrates that visits to arts institutions cannot be explained either by structural conditions or by individual choice alone, but by a combination of both. I demonstrate this by combining Bourdieu's theory of practice and Giddens' structuration theory to produce a reconciled model of an agency-structure-feedback loop, applying this model to analyse the societal significance of museums and museum visits. The reciprocal relationship of structure and agency connects Giddens' agency-driven museum visitor with Bourdieu's structure-driven museum visitor.This case of museum analysis shows that an agency-structure polarity does not reflect reality. Neither do museums (structure) fully determine museum visitors (agency) nor do museum visitors fully determine museums (structure).

Gathering contributions by leading social development scholars, this report offers a comprehensive description of the national development of cultural consumption in China. By comparing the annual growth of cultural consumption, GDP growth, per-capita income growth and savings growth, the authors reveal the disparity between urban and rural areas in terms of cultural consumption, as well as that between provinces. Based on an analysis of the status quo of cultural consumption in China, the book explores the road to a prosperous society and enhancing China's cultural development.

Gathering contributions by leading social development scholars, this report offers a comprehensive description of the national development of cultural consumption in China. By comparing the annual growth of cultural consumption, GDP growth, per-capita income growth and savings growth, the authors reveal the disparity between urban and rural areas in terms of cultural consumption, as well as that between provinces. Based on an analysis of the status quo of cultural consumption in China, the book explores the road to a prosperous society and enhancing China's cultural development.

Gathering contributions by leading social development scholars, this report offers a comprehensive description of the national development of cultural consumption in China. By comparing the annual growth of cultural consumption, GDP growth, per-capita income growth and savings growth, the authors reveal the disparity between urban and rural areas in terms of cultural consumption, as well as that between provinces. Based on an analysis of the status quo of cultural consumption in China, the book explores the road to a prosperous society and enhancing China's cultural development

The concept of life-style seems to have been thoroughly naturalised, both academically and in common parlance. There is little critical interrogation of what life-style involves, beyond its connection to cultural and aesthetic aspects of consumption. What are the implications of accepting this culturalised description of consumption and its shorthand designation, 'lifestyle'? This polemical paper interrogates both the linguistic and conceptual challenges associated with the term, and argues that it acts to efface and erase important social differences of wealth, opportunity, class, gender and ethnicity, as well as obscuring global and historical inequalities.