Modesto Gayo

Patrones culturales de uso del tiempo libre en Chile: Una aproximación desde la teoría Bourdieuana

Resumen es: En los ultimos anos, ha cobrado una creciente importancia el estudio de los patrones de participacion y gusto culturales. A este respecto, la obra del so...

EXCLUSIVIDAD Y FRAGMENTACIÓN: LOS PERFILES CULTURALES DE LA CLASE MEDIA EN CHILE

La literatura sociologica sobre la clase media alta, desarrollada fundamentalmente en la segunda parte del siglo XX, nos ha permitido conocer en detalle su comportamiento politico y cultural, principalmente en los casos de Europa occidental y Estados Unidos. De este trabajo podemos extraer dos tesis que con+ guran la imagen de esta clase social: la exclusividad y la fragmentacion. Exclusividad porque sus miembros muestran un comportamiento politico frecuentemente similar al de las clases mas altas de la sociedad y un patron cultural en donde el re+ namiento y la educacion han sido elementos centrales de su formacion como clase. Fragmentacion porque tanto su comportamiento politico como su aproximacion mas individualista a la actividad cultural estarian asociados a una importante heterogeneidad interna. Sin embargo, sobre todo a proposito de este segundo aspecto, su eventual division, existe mucha mas informacion sobre su comportamiento politico que sobre el que atiende a los gustos y la participacion cultural. El presente articulo toma como punto de partida las contribuciones previas y estudia para el caso chileno los per+ les de exclusividad y fragmentacion. En el caso del primer per+ l, enfrentamos a la clase media con lo que aqui entendemos como la clase obrera, a partir de cuya comparacion pueden identi+ carse orientaciones hacia la practica cultural muy diferentes entre ambas clases sociales. En lo que respecta a la fragmentacion, estamos ante una tematica mucho menos explorada en la sociologia y aqui proponemos una division que separa con claridad a los �profesionales� de las otras categorias ocupacionales que conforman esta clase. Ademas, estudiamos la estructura social de la fragmentacion de la clase media.

Revisiting middle-class politics: a multidimensional approach – evidence from Spain

The sociological tradition of thinking about the middle class has made a very significant contribution to the understanding of politics in advanced contemporary societies. This paper approaches the case of Spain within a conceptual and empirical framework derived from that work. Its point of departure is that most analysis of social class in sociology and political science to date has relied on class schemes that attempt to explain single subjects or dimensions of particular phenomena. Political sociology, for example, has produced numerous single-dimension studies on issues such as voting, political participation, and political values or attitudes. These kinds of study tend to produce neat and unambiguous conclusions. A more nuanced picture emerges from the present study, which adopts an alternative, multidimensional analysis. The study compares the behaviour of social classes, and above all of fractions of the middle class, in each of the four areas of voting, political ideology, political participation, and political values. Doing so, the results present a much more complex picture of middle-class politics than has traditionally been available. The significance of these results is twofold. First, we see that an accurate description of the political behaviour of the middle class cannot be reduced to a dichotomous unitary versus heterogeneous dilemma, or to conservative versus leftist views, since the political stand of this social class is essentially ‘ambivalent’. Secondly, these results strongly suggest that theoretical work on this and similar types of phenomena should more frequently take into account the complexity of actually observed behaviour, rather than relying on the often thinner or simpler patterns from which sociological knowledge has too often been derived.

THE THEORY OF CULTURAL CAPITAL AND THE CULTURAL PARTICIPATION OF YOUNG PEOPLE: THE CHILEAN CASE AS AN EXAMPLE

Bourdieu’s cultural capital theory has had an ambivalent relationship with the idea of «youth». On the one hand, the first steps in life are key moments for ...

LA TEORÍA DEL CAPITAL CULTURAL Y LA PARTICIPACIÓN CULTURAL DE LOS JÓVENES: EL CASO CHILENO COMO EJEMPLO

Bourdieu’s cultural capital theory has had an ambivalent relationship with the idea of «youth». On the one hand, the first steps in life are key moments for ...

El problema de la delimitación o boundary problem. Una aproximación a la definición de la clase media

El declive del interes en la perspectiva de clase en ciencias sociales como enfoque para la explicacion de los fenomenos sociales no ha ido acompanado de la total desaparicion del vocabulario de clase. En efecto, en la actualidad es cada vez mas habitual encontrarse frente a debates sobre la clase media tanto dentro de la academia como en el area del comentario social. En este sentido, la clase media es considerada expresion no solo de una realidad social, sino de un deber ser politico. Aunque el termino clase media es utilizado con mucha frecuencia, mas alla de los textos sociologicos, este articulo enfatiza que no ha existido acuerdo entre academicos sobre su definicion, lo cual ha impedido trazar de forma consensuada y unanime fronteras entre esta clase y las otras. Este ha sido conocido como el boundary problem o, como lo traducimos aqui, el problema de la delimitacion de las fronteras de clase. El objetivo de este articulo es presentar este problema en toda su complejidad, y por ello hablamos de su definicion, las condiciones intelectuales en que emerge, sus causas, y las soluciones que se han adelantado.

Frantic Lives and Practices of Socio-Cultural Differentiation

This chapter provides evidence of a connection between parents’ cultural engagement during their childhoods and the kind of involvement they favor for their own children. Additionally, we demonstrate and describe a neat interrelation between processes of cultural reproduction and social mobility into the higher ranks of society. In other words, we see that cultural activism is inscribed in people’s biographies, in a process similar to the one described in Chap. 3 regarding the relationship between residential and school choices and socio-spatial trajectories. We contend that the practices of cultural and social activism described here are also embedded in particular social networks of family, school friends, and work colleagues, all constituting effective social bonds that help reproduce social positioning.

Social Mobility over Time and in Space: Ascending Residential and Social Trajectories

This chapter examines the ways in which Santiago’s barrio alto has grown over the past decades, leading to high levels of social segregation of the most privileged. The offer of housing for the upper middle classes, and upward occupational mobility, has raised expectations of belonging to this class. Social and spatial mobility into and within the barrio alto is not, however, a random happenstance. It is structured along lines delineating less and more privileged places, trajectories, and settings. In this chapter, we explore various types of socio-spatial trajectories of our upper middle class interviewees, which demonstrate the imbricated relationships between intergenerational, occupational, and residential trajectories. Nevertheless, living and staying in the barrio alto is not a trivial matter even for the more privileged. Many actively struggle to be there, at the apex of the Chilean social pyramid.

Common Ground: On the Centrality of Residential and School Choice

This chapter demonstrates that expectations from residential and school choices are closely interrelated: those who have high expectations in one domain will have high expectations in the other. Over 40% of our upper middle class respondents report high expectations in areas such as educational and professional success and good and adequate environments for educational and cultural achievement, among others. Most importantly, expectations are also related to socio-spatial trajectories: those who have long occupied a privileged position inherited from their parents also have higher expectations from housing and schooling. We contend that residential choice is most definitely a priority in terms of a series of decisions or mix of choices. In choosing a place of residence, the upper middle class also takes into account the opinion of their intimate networks. They are mainly interested in the ways in which children may develop social capital at school. The upper middle class expects rather distinctive competences to be acquired at school. This group values the development of critical thinking, artistic competences, and a second language, among other skills.

Inheritors, Achievers, and Incomers: Wrapping Up a Multidimensional Approach to Social Reproduction

This chapter brings together the main findings from each chapter, to provide evidence that shows that social mobility and residential mobility are very significantly related, but that these two types of mobility are also associated with other components of everyday life that define upper middle class expectations, parenting practices, cultural repertoires, and politics. In this chapter, we propose a typology composed of three main clusters: Inheritors, Achievers, and Incomers. Taken together, these depict an internal class fragmentation in a dense and complex way. We also show how certain groups are most privileged in reproducing their positions, while others face particular constraints, which are not only material but also cultural and political.