Saturday, September 05, 2015

Our Taste Shows More in the Categories We Value Than in the Goods We Choose

I have begun a research project looking at the coherence of our tastes.

Today we beta tested the interview with two couples I know well.

As the conversation developed, the main subject of our concerns was more about how our values shaped our lives.  Our tastes appeared not in particular objects, but more in which categories of objects or practices we thought represented important choices or tradeoffs of values, and which were more utilitarian.

I think we will still be able to pursue our ultimate, Bourdieuian, objective in exploring the relationship between class fraction and taste.  I think people in different places in the class and status structure will value different categories of goods and practices differently.  Which specific goods they choose, though, will probably turn out to be of secondary importance.

2 comments:

Barry said...

Am I correct in interpeting this post that the research will tell us why some of us select Esclades versus Subarus or GE versus Viking appliances

Gruntled said...

That is what this kind of research usually aims to discover. However, in the initial interviews, at least, what came out were not the brands that mattered but the categories of goods and practices that were worth investing choice and value in. So I am not sure what, exactly, we will use as the metric of taste in the end.