As we have discussed so far, culture encompasses a lot of how we live and experience our day to day life. However, culture is not neutral. It can be used to create and sustain inequalities. Specifically, it can be used in the production of class, gender, and race inequalities. In this section we will explore some of the cultural processes involved in creating inequalities.

6.4.1 High Culture and Popular Culture

One area where culture is intertwined with inequalities is within taste cultures. Scholars and the general population will commonly refer to taste cultures, such as high culture, popular culture, or mass culture. Gans (1974) defined taste culture as areas of culture that share aesthetics and standards of taste. Aesthetics broadly refer to standards of beauty, but also a variety of other emotional and intellectual values people see in particular cultural content.

High culture is the forms of cultural expression associated with elite groups. This includes art museums, opera, the symphony, ballet, classic music, plays, high end restaurants. In the United States, this is typically the culture of elite white people from coastal cities (for example, New York City, Boston, and San Francisco). Historically, this culture was called “highbrow” because of theories from the 18th century that associated the capability to understand this type of culture with intellectual superiority and having a particular skull shape that had a high brow. These theories are discredited. Familiarity with high culture can be used by the elites to help determine access to opportunities, as we will explore in the next section on cultural capital.

Figure 6.3. Image of food cart pod in autumn. Food culture is an important aspect of any culture. When might we consider food part of high culture? When might it be considered part of popular culture? What are some unique features about the food culture of the Pacific Northwest?

Popular culture is widely accessible and commonly shared aspects of culture (e.g., books, movies, TV shows) consumed by all classes (the masses), but typically associated with lower and middle classes.

Popular culture is accessible by most and is expressed and spread via commercial and social media outlets such as radio, television, movies, the music industry, publishers, and corporate-run websites. For example, you can share a discussion of favorite football teams with a new coworker or comment on a reality show when making small talk in line at the grocery store. But if you tried to launch into a deep discussion on the classical Greek play Antigone, you might get some strange looks. Although high culture may be considered by some as superior to popular culture, the lines between high culture and popular culture vary over time and place. Shakespearean plays, considered to be popular culture when they were written, are now part of our society’s high culture. From a sociological perspective, high culture is not inherently better or more important than popular culture, and sociologists study both.

6.4.2 Cultural Capital

The concept of cultural capital has its origins in the work of Pierre Bourdieu (1984; 1986), a well known French sociologist. Cultural capital can be defined as the resources and power derived from being familiar with high (or legitimated) culture. So this includes tastes, habits, expectations, skills, knowledge and other dispositions. Cultural capital is something that is learned. It is taught in the family, primarily in the families of the upper middle class and upper class. Cultural capital is also taught and reinforced in the education system, especially higher education (think art history classes, studying literary classics). The idea with this is that schools are middle class institutions that put a value on particular tastes, behavior, and skills. Schools will reward people that have the “correct” cultural capital, while also helping build one’s cultural capital. As we will discuss more in Chapter 8, schools tend to reward children from middle class backgrounds. The concept assumes there is a one to one mapping of class on to culture, those in the dominant class will consume high or legitimate culture, while those that are working class or poor consume mass or popular culture.

Three types of cultural capital identified by Bourdieu are embodied cultural capital, objectified cultural capital, and institutionalized cultural capital. Embodied cultural capital is cultural capital that is internalized during socialization and constitutes schemes of appreciation and understanding. It requires investment of time by parents, family members, or hired professionals to sensitize one to cultural distinctions (Swartz 1997). It is not only how we think, it includes how we hold ourselves and present ourselves to others (Hallett 2003). Objectified cultural capital is when cultural capital is turned into specific objects such as books or works of art that require embodied cultural capital to be understood. An example could be possessing and displaying an original work of a well known artist in your home. Institutionalized cultural capital materializes as degrees and diplomas from the education system that show you have the correct cultural capital (Lamont and Lareau 1988). It means going to the “right” school and having the diploma to show it.

Cultural capital preserves and reproduces the class structure, because it’s used to include and exclude others, defining access to a particular class. For those wishing to get important jobs or acquire (political or economic) power, cultural capital serves as a criteria for access. You have to show a familiarity with high culture to be accepted. Research by Lauren Rivera (2012) shows that notions of “fit” will be used to evaluate applicants for jobs at elite professional service firms. “Fit” ends up meaning having the same culture as the people that already work there. This limits opportunities for a diverse workforce and the exchange of different perspectives.

Further, familiarity and participation in high culture operates to build connections among the dominant class. Attending something like an opera in New York City is an opportunity to interact with other people in a similar class situation and create class solidarity. Further, participating in such events could be used in interactions as a means to judge others’ class standing. The overall point of the concept in Bourdieu’s work was “to suggest that culture (in the broadest sense of the term) can become a power resource” (Swartz 1997: 75).

6.4.3 Taste Patterns

Going into a little more detail about the relationship between inequalities and taste patterns. Within sociology there are a variety of arguments about the relationship between class hierarchies and cultural hierarchies. Bourdieu’s perspective aligns with the homology argument which states that consumption patterns and cultural tastes are associated with specific occupations and class fractions. Similar to cultural capital, we see a one to one mapping of class onto culture. This means that the elite consume high culture, while the lower class consumes popular culture.

Bourdieu (1984) specifically argued the upper class have a “taste for freedom” that informs all of their cultural choices. This entails a distance from the material necessities and practical urgencies of everyday life. Those in the upper class don’t have to worry about paying rent or providing food for their family. In turn, they can focus on things like art or opera, high culture, things that aren’t really that practical to everyday life. In contrast, the working class must confront the needs and urgencies of making a living, resulting in a “taste for necessity.” Here there is a general preference for things that are substantive and informal.

The opposite of the homology argument is the individualization argument, a rather postmodern argument. From this perspective consumption patterns are no longer determined by class. Theorists holding this position generally point to the supposed decomposition of class hierarchies and the rising influence of gender, race, and religion as sources of consumption patterns. They also point to the changing production, marketing, and consumer patterns and how they have led to a proliferation of images and identities that no longer correspond to particular classes. Just think of the number of cultural objects that are now available to us through the internet. With so many options available it might be hard to predict someone’s consumption based on their social location. Some supporters of this argument argue that it is almost a free for all, and there is no way to determine consumption patterns (Beck 1992).

In between the class homology argument and the individualization argument you get the omnivore/univore argument. Here the argument is that there has been a transition in the tastes of the dominant class away from participation in a limited number of high status activities. Instead there is a move by the dominant groups towards greater participation in all types of activities and taste preferences, some of which are considered low status. They become cultural omnivores (Chan and Goldthorpe 2005). This has been termed as a shift from snobbishness to omnivorousness (Peterson and Kern 1996). It basically means a new way to show your eliteness is by being open to appreciating a wide range of cultural activities and genres. However, there are limits to this openness, where particular activities or genres associated with groups seen having a lower social standing are excluded (Bryson 1996).

While this has occurred, those in the dominated classes have been shown to mainly participate in just a few types of cultural activities, or a narrow range of activities. Usually those cultural activities are associated with their ethnicity, occupation, or locality hence their label as cultural univores. One of the best ways to think about this is in terms of a particular medium, like music. Omnivore would like a bunch of different types of music, while a univore would probably like only one. This taste pattern has been found in a variety of national contexts and in different areas such as the visual arts, and going out to eat, among others (Alderson et al. 2007; Katz-Gerro 2002).

6.4.4 Boundary Drawing

Another way culture can be used to create and sustain inequalities is through the process of boundary drawing. Boundaries can be symbolic or social. Symbolic boundaries are conceptual distinctions made by people to categorize a wide variety of social things. This can include people, groups, and objects, but also more broadly how we categorize space and time. You can think of them as defining who or what is included and excluded. Social boundaries result when symbolic boundaries are widely agreed upon. Social boundaries involve unequal access to resources and opportunities (Lamont and Molnar 2002). These social boundaries can be built into our society, including some people, while excluding others.

A concrete example of boundary drawing are the borders that exist between countries. It is at these borders that citizenship is enforced. Decisions are made to allow some people into a country, while denying access to others. Some sociologists have described borders as “instrumental in the construction of difference” (Lamont and Molar 2002: 184).

We could also apply boundary drawing to the attempted construction of a Southern border wall in the United States. One way to interpret it would be through the writings of Frantz Fanon. He developed a sociology of walls to explain French colonization practices in Algeria (Go 2020). He argued “The colonized world is a compartmentalized world. The dividing line, the border, is represented by the barracks and the police stations. . . . The “native” sector is not complementary to the European sector. The two confront each other, but not in the service of a higher unity” (Fanon [1961] 1968:3–4). In his framework such a boundary is clearly tied to race, while having strong effects on those that are included and those that are excluded. While both a symbolic and social boundary, the Southern border wall also has clear connections to race and exclusion.

Boundary drawing can also be used to define who belongs and who benefits in terms of race, class, and gender. Cultural capital is one way people draw boundaries along the lines of class. We will explore classed boundary drawing more in Chapter 8. In terms of race, the boundaries around whiteness is something that sociologists have increasingly turned their attention towards . Over time some groups that were previously defined as non-white became seen as white. Being included as white comes with a variety of privileges. We will explore this more in Chapter 11.

6.4.5 Othering

Othering refers to the process where a group that already has a lot of power, defines into existence a group they construct as an “other”. The powerful group does this by attributing negative characteristics to the “other” and deems the less powerful group as inferior (Schwalbe et al. 2000). In other words it involves creating categories and assigning people to those categories. Those with power assume the less powerful group is inferior in some manner. This process is commonly used to support racial and imperial oppression.

Within the West, there is a tendency to engage in Orientalism. Here “the Orient” is seen as an “other.” Edward Said (1979) argues that “the Orient” was actually invented by those in the West during the 18th and 19th centuries. This process “is predicated upon an unquestioned belief in Western superiority and upon the conviction that, as the East cannot understand itself” (Macey 2000:283). It allowed those in the West to develop an identity as “Western.” And to present themselves as the center of the world and human progress. Simultaneously this included defining those outside the West as “other,” “inferior,” “backwards,” or “child-like.” This helped justify European colonialism and exploitation. Even sociology and anthropology from the United States has reinforced such othering (Fabian 1983; Conn ell 2007). Orientalism as a particular form of othering still exists in the United States, look no further than media coverage of people from the Middle East (Lajevardi 2021).