Distinction Analysis : Pierre Bourdieu 's Theory Of Social Life

In the opening to Paul Fussell’s essay “A Touchy Subject”, he observes that no one really quite understands how class works, and each class theorizes the deciding factors between them, through the colored lenses of station. Of interest though, is the description he gives of the Upper Class, who “perceive that taste, values, ideas, style, and behavior are indispensable criteria of class, regardless of money or occupation or education” (McQuade) If that criteria is taken and applied to society, other social classes are revealed that lie hidden within the umbrella of Low, Middle and Upper. There is a group of people that embodies their own values, who celebrate their ideas, flaunt their style and act with a certain behaviors, and they have formed a class of their own; Geekdom.

Power, class and status are all interlinked to social and cultural capital in reinforcing inequality. People who have a low income and status, and belong to the working class tend to not have as many social networks and support as well as the cultural ‘taste’ and values as those who are able to afford much more than them. Skeggs (as cited in Watt 2008) points out how people with the working-class identity do not receive the social support like other ‘ordinary people’ in the

Writer Gregory Mantsios in his article “Class in America”, talks about these things, and how wide the gap is between the rich and the poor and also discusses how the rich continue to get richer, while the poor continue to get poorer. Mantsios gives his readers the profiles and backgrounds of three hard-working Americans, two of them are white males, whose family background as well as education played a role in their success, while the other person is a black woman who is just above the poverty line despite her work as a nurse’s aide. Through these profiles, Mantsios article shows exactly how sex, race and shows how your parental and educational background of a person can play a role in the things that you achieve. Mantsios also talks about one’s performance in school and the level of school completed can suggest whether or not class that person may belong in.

The axis of inequality that will be focused throughout this paper is the social class. Social class is defined as a group of individuals who are categorized according to class (i.e. poor, middle, and upper) due to their income, wealth, power, and occupation. Social class is socially constructed by the way we view how much income and wealth a person possess (Ore, 20011a, 10). In reality it is much more than that. According to the text, poverty is not only the shortage of income, but it is the rejection of opportunities and choices that leads a person to a standard way of living (Ore, 2011a, 10). Stereotyping also contributes to it being socially constructed. These stereotypes influence us by defining who is who based on their principles in each class category. This can cause some to feel worthless.

This week’s readings are following the theme of the class, and its connection to forming a family and child rearing. There are three articles that discuss the way children are raised, the effect of marriage on the class and on the growing inequality as well as the pressure that people face due to instability in their jobs and economic life. Connecting socioeconomics and sociocentrism orientation, class and family are shown from different angles in order to understand inequalities and class divisions.

The two types of capital are cultural capital and economic capital. This is then used by showing the resulting inequalities and allocating various social slots for men and women based on said differences. This in turn legitimizes the inheritance of social privileges in societies where democracy is thought to be the right and virtuous way. (Wacquant, 1996)

The bourgeoisie used politics, new technological developments, and religion to manipulate the economics and to insure their control sustaining their status. In doing this they kept the proletariats salves to the rich helpless against their control. Capital is a social product and only exists in the social systems. It is not personal but a social power and the lower class becomes dependant on the elite for his survival.

might the resulting contrasts suggest about the role of class in shaping social experience in The

USA is a very big country with a lot of people and the social classes are very important. We can see that social class plays big part of people’s life. Everyday people are working, studying, trying to be better. Even though right now it’s time when everyone has many opportunities in his life, anyway there is a gap between classes and groups of people with same features. And your background probably will build your future. And we need to find what kind of class we have right now and look into these classes. The main idea is that Social Classes still exist and it’s most general part of U.S.A society. There are three reasons why gap between groups still exist.

Thus, when all students are required to dress the same in school, from tops to shoes, they won’t be able to show off their wealth. There shouldn’t be any great distances in economic matters between students because they are sensitive subjects to most people.

Bourdieu’s theory of cultural capital has been extremely influential, and has garnered a great deal of literature, both theoretical and empirical. Like Marx, Bourdieu posited that capital was the foundation of social life and dictated people’s position within the social hierarchy (Bourdieu 1986). According to Bourdieu, the more capital one possesses, the more prestigious a position one occupies in social life (Bourdieu 1986). In addition to that, Bourdieu extended Marx’s idea of capital beyond the economic and into cultural symbolism (Bourdieu 1986). Bourdieu’s concept of cultural capital that refers to the collection of symbolic elements (e.g. skills, tastes, clothing) one acquires through being part of a particular social niche and his concept of habitus that refers to the physical manifestation of cultural capital owned by individuals due to life experiences are his major influential concepts that are very useful in deconstructing power in development and social change processes. However it must be recognized that these concepts also propagate social inequalities at the same time. This essay will closely examine his concepts of capital that comes in three forms - embodied, objectified, and institutionalised, and habitus in the fields of education and stratification have made of it. Bourdieu’s work will be analysed in the context both of the debate on class inequalities in educational attainment and of class reproduction in advanced capitalist societies.

Karl Marx describes “Society as a whole [as being] more and more [split] up into two great hostile camps, into two great classes directly facing each other-bourgeoisie and proletariat” (Marx 124).  As Marx made his distinction between upper class, bourgeoisie, and lower class, proletariats, it is important to keep in mind the societal structure at the time.  To understand how classes were created and the disparity between the rich and poor, or, bourgeoisie and proletariat, it is necessary to examine how people came to be rich and poor.  Exploring a time before money existed will help us to process and understand reasons why the binary between rich and poor exists and how it is reflective of low and high art distinctions.

Society is constructed in such a way that some people become inferior to other people because of how society treats certain individuals. Fashion has become a catalyst that leaves a gap between the lower class and the upper class; this brings out the aspect of social structure as it ranks categories of people in a hierarchy,( Macious & Plummer, 2008).Bourdieu’s concepts of field, habitus, social capital and cultural capital gives an illustration of the elite and the lower class in terms of their fashion taste. This essay consists of three parts; the first part will look at the London Fashion Week applying Bourdieu’s concepts, the second part will describe the difference sorts of capital required for elite women to join the ‘secret club’ of

So sometimes fashion cannot distinguish between social classes and clothes worn by an upper class individual can be similar to clothes worn by people of a lower class.

It’s evident that Marx and Bourdieu’s understandings of capitalism do not fit congruently at all. After investigating this, it’s not surprising that their social sources of alienation and anything else to that regard don’t fit well either. It is true that Bourdieu never set out to describe alienation in his works, but he does describe how people’s perceptions, tastes and practices are the product of historical and social circumstances. In regards to social sources of alienation, the consequences of alienation and the role of alienation in social theories, Marx and Bourdieu are the complete opposite. Bourdieu’s take on capital is similar to the idea or category of wealth which fails to show profit or exploitation as the social sources and the