Jef Vlegels

Music genres as historical artifacts: the case of classical music

This article reflects on the use of predetermined genre lists to measure patterns in music taste and, more specifically, classical music taste. Classical music as a whole is in quantitative research typically treated as marker of cultural prestige, although qualitative research suggests great internal diversity within the genre. The use of a predetermined array of genres to measure music taste risks to miss these subdivisions within the classical music genre and thus produces biased results. Therefore, inspired by Lamont’s (2010) call to study classification systems ‘from the ground up’, we present an alternative strategy to measure classical music taste using an open question about artist preferences. We build a two-mode network of classical music artists and respondents and use Infinite Relational Models to identify clusters of respondents that have similar relationships to the same set of artists. We detect no less than five distinct listening patterns within the classical music genre. Two of these preference clusters focus only on very central, popular classical artists. Another cluster combines these popular artists with more contemporary artists. One cluster focuses on only one very accessible artist and, finally, there is a cluster of respondents that distinct themselves by having a real connoisseur taste. Furthermore, we find that expert taste in classical music is not related to social distinction. Instead, knowledge of the most central and popular artists (e.g. Bach, Beethoven, Mozart) is typical for respondents with a high socio-economic background. Social distinction seems more related to knowledge of popular artists in classical music than to distinctive, connoisseur taste. Our findings show the potential of social network analysis for the problem of music taste classification and cultural sociology in general.

On intergenerational differences in highbrow cultural participation. Is the Internet at home an explanatory factor in understanding lower highbrow participation among younger cohorts

This article uses a series of cross-sectional data sets from 2001 to 2010 to study differences in highbrow cultural participation among subsequent generations in Belgium. Using an Age-Period-Cohort model, we first assess whether and to what degree highbrow cultural participation differs between birth cohorts, age groups, and periods. Second, we examine whether or not having Internet access at home is a contributing factor in understanding intergenerational differences. We assess whether Internet access at home enhances or displaces highbrow cultural participation and look into the different effects of Internet access on different generations. Results suggest that highbrow cultural participation is indeed declining among younger cohorts, indicating a weakening position of highbrow culture in the lives of young people. But, having Internet access at home cannot be regarded as a competitive force for highbrow participation. On the contrary, Internet access is associated with higher levels of highbrow cultural participation. Moreover, this positive association is most pronounced in the youngest birth cohorts.