Enter Culture, Exit Arts?

The Transformation of Cultural Hierarchies in European Newspaper Culture Sections, 1960–2010

Jukka Gronow author Semi Purhonen author Riie Heikkilä author Tina Lauronen author Irmak Karademir Hazir author Carlos Fernández Rodríguez author

Format:Hardback

Publisher:Taylor & Francis Ltd

Published:2nd Oct '18

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Enter Culture, Exit Arts? cover

Key debates of contemporary cultural sociology – the rise of the ‘cultural omnivore’, the fate of classical ‘highbrow’ culture, the popularization, commercialization and globalization of culture – deal with temporal changes. Yet, systematic research about these processes is scarce due to the lack of suitable longitudinal data. This book explores these questions through the lens of a crucial institution of cultural mediation – the culture sections in quality European newspapers – from 1960 to 2010.

Starting from the framework of cultural stratification and employing systematic content analysis both quantitative and qualitative of more than 13,000 newspaper articles, Enter Culture, Exit Arts? presents a synthetic yet empirically rich and detailed account of cultural transformation in Europe over the last five decades. It shows how classifications and hierarchies of culture have changed in course of the process towards increased cultural heterogeneity. Furthermore, it conceptualizes the key trends of rising popular culture and declining highbrow arts as two simultaneous processes: the one of legitimization of popular culture and the other of popularization of traditional legitimate culture, both important for the loosening of the boundary between ‘highbrow’ and ‘popular’.

Through careful comparative analysis and illustrative snapshots into the specific socio-historical contexts in which the newspapers and their representations of culture are embedded – in Finland, France, Spain, Sweden, Turkey and the UK – the book reveals the key patterns and diversity of European variations in the transformation of cultural hierarchies since the 1960s. The book is a collective endeavour of a large-scale international research project active between 2013 and 2018.

'A valuable and original comparative study addressing current debates about cultural change.'

- Alan Warde, Professor of Sociology, School of Social Sciences, University of Manchester, UK

"Enter Culture, Exit Arts? is a meticulous, multi-method study that leverages comparisons across countries and over time to maximum effect. Through the comparison of trajectories of discourses on culture, the authors are able to make sense of large-scale cultural changes while also smartly pushing forward our understanding of numerous core issues in cultural sociology. The clear writing and organization of the book into thematic chapters will make it useful for both scholars and students."

- Shyon Baumann, Professor of Sociology, University of Toronto, Canada

"This is a timely and pioneering contribution to cultural sociology, since many debates about the developments in classifications of cultural production and consumption are about change over time, but often without systematic longitudinal empirical analysis. The authors’ comparative analysis combines empirical solidity in describing and exploring the changes in detail with theoretical nuance in relating the empirical details to key sociological dynamics in the processes of ‘loosening’ the boundary between ‘highbrow’ and ‘popular’ cultural classifications."

- Bente Halkier, Professor, University of Copenhagen, Denmark

"Drawing on an impressive data collection, this book contributes to the cross-national study of how cultural classification systems have changed over time. It is an excellent empirical study of transformations in the European cultural field in the past half-century that revisits important questions regarding artistic legitimation and cultural globalization, while also offering new directions for thinking about the evolution of cultural hierarchies."

- Marc Verboord, Associate Professor, Department of Media & Communication, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands

ISBN: 9781138740556

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: 498g

256 pages