Cultural Capital, Agency and Othering

Following a cut and paste of an email I sent to the English Teacher's Advocacy Group I've posted it here as a way to archive the doc and maybe come back to some of these ideas later.

I wanted to respond to some of the ideas explored at the last meeting, specifically about the VATE mini-conference and issues that may arise from what, to my very vague understanding, seems to focus on ‘teaching English in Other contexts to Other people’. We touched slightly on ‘whose English, for what purposes?’ and the problems that are inherent in Othering (ie the assumption of a center or a mainstream - that ‘we’ are all part of - and sits in opposition to Others (blacks, queers, 2nd language-English speakers, etc). And that without a critical examination of various forms of youth/student culture and teaching practices and ourselves, this assumption will go unchecked which to me would be appalling. There was a brief mentioned of cultural capital, control and resistant subcultures… I’ve typed below what I think are some interesting ideas and quotes about this area of study and social practice (which may counter some potential problems):

The study of subcultures, deriving from the Birmingham School (Richard Hoggart & Stuart Hall), seems to explore ideas of power and class, in particular, and originally concerned itself with youth consumption practices and the manner in which cultural capital was hijacked or acquired by subgroups. Semiotic approaches have read the clothing, cultural practices, language use, etc of various subcultures as signs. Studies have particularly focused on the oppositional/subversive power these signs have against dominant classes; “the subculture may therefore be seen to negotiate a cultural space, in which the contradictory demands of the dominant parent culture can be worked through, or resisted, and in which the group can express and develop its own identity” p 37 Edgar and Sedgwick, Key Concepts in Cultural Theory. Routledge: London, 1999.

So, what is the effect of subcultural practices at a time of extremism; “you’re either with us or against us”? And who is this imagined us? If the mini-conference, or even discussions amongst The Advocacy Group, does not critically examine this us and them rhetoric, then what kind of conversations can occur, what type of futures are possible? And who can be involved? It always seems to come back to that question ‘whose English and for what purpose?’ And of course the advocacy group does and has already discussed this (sorry if I’m going over old ground).

According to Sarah Thornton, in “The Social Logic of Subcultural Capitalism”, the Birmingham School constructed youthful consumer choices as “ proto-political acts, ultimately explaining the logic of their cultural consumption in terms of its ‘opposition’ to vague social bodies variously called the parent culture (or).. the mainstream.” P200. Thornton says such studies have “over-politicised youthful pleasure and at the same time ignored the subtle relations of power at play within it.” (p201)

Her construction of subcultural ideologies, is as follows: “(they) are a means by which youth imagine their own and other social groups, assert their distinctive character and affirm that they are not anonymous members of an undifferentiated mass.. ideologies which fulfil the specific cultural agendas of their beholders…” p 201.

“cultural capital is embodied in the form of being ‘in the know’, using (but not over-using) current slang and looking as if you were born to perform the latest dance styles. Both cultural and subcultural capital put a premium on the ‘second nature’ of their knowledges. Nothing depletes capital more than the sight of someone trying too hard.” Thornton p 203

“in a post-industrial world where consumers are incited to individualise themselves and where the operations of power seem to favour classification and segregation, it is hard to regard difference as necessarily progressive. The flexibility of new modes of commodity production and the expansion of multiple media supports micro-communities and fragmented niche cultures…” Thornton 209

“The social logic of subcultural capital reveals itself most clearly by what it dislikes and by what it emphatically isn’t.” Thornton p 208.

DJs ..organisers… “often enjoy a lot of respect not only because of their high volume of subcultural capital, but because of their role in defining and creating it.” Thornton p203

‘mainstream’ (eg yuppies, louts…) “are more than euphemisms of social class and status; they demonstrate ‘how we create groups with words’… the distinction reveals more about the cultural values and social world of hardcore clubbers.. ‘nothing classifies somebody more than the way s/he classifies’ (see Bourdieu)” Thornton 203.