Contrast Pierre Bourdieu's concepts of culture, taste and distinction with Zygmunt Bauman's

concept of culture that characterises consumersist society in liquid modernity. (max 500 words)

Pierre Bourdieu and Zygmunt Bauman are both sociologist who focused on explaining the
understanding of culture and its role in the society. Their perspective were significantly
different.

Pierre Bourdieu defines culture in terms of cultural competence as an ability to decode a

piece of art and a process of communication. He claims that the culture can be enjoyed if
one knows a code. It is not enough to know how to read because more elaborate piece of
art – the higher code is. For instance, if one wants to decode music a code may be an ability
to distinguish the genre, musical instruments or the time when it was made. Based on the
taste one can divide into classes because our choices describe us – cultural practices and
choices are tied to social class. Art is made when an artis aims to create it. If the intention of
the artist is to produce a functional element of everyday life, then it’s not a piece of art. We
talk about an ideal piece of art when an artist doesn’t care what is imposed on him, meaning
what kind of work he should produce or what impact it may have on the audience. A
popular taste is what most people expect from the art/ the culture to be. It is shaped by
social context. Most of the society wants art to represent reality – art should be functional
and useful. For Bordieu reality is the art of low level because it tries to represent real life. He
cherishes art that tries to do something with the form and be experimental (impressionism -
you do not see on the painting anything real but the colours or shapes are important here,
not reality and the meaning comes from this, not from realistic presentation of some
landscape).

Zygmunt Bauman explains culture in terms of a liquid modernity which is a metaphor that
describes a constant mobility and change in culture (relationships, identities, global
economics within contemporary society) caused by capitalism and information revolution.
He describes how culture has changed from the 18th century. In 18th century culture was
supposed to be a navigation and development, a human perfection, enlightenment and
spreading of civilization. In the 19th century colonialism governed the world. Romanticism
introduced the term of nationalism and the concept of nation and national identity. WWI
and WWII introduced a status quo and now there are no borders only liquid barriers of
consumerism because everything is constantly changing.

To sum up, Bourdieu and Bauman have contrasting views on the role of culture in society.
Bourdieu focuses on the relationship between cultural practices and social class, and how
people use these practices to demonstrate their social status. Bauman highlights the fluidity
and consumer-driven nature of cultural consumption in a globalized world.