Reproduction of Cultural Capital and Leisure Practices in the Russian Society: Does Bourdieu Work?

Context specificity of stratifying factors is often alleged, but attempts to systematically test applicability of theories outside the context of their emergence are still relatively rare. Bourdieu’s ideas on cultural consumption and leisure practices were lucky in this respect. Due to their centrality for the late XX century sociology of culture and stratification, and general feeling that they have specifically French flavour, their applicability have been tested for a variety of national contexts (the US, Hungary, China, Australia). Thus, studies carried out in the US demonstrated that the opposition of high- and low leisure activities find only partial equivalent there (DiMaggio, Kingston, Lamont, Mohr). This study evaluates applicability of Bourdieu’s concept to the Russian context. We specifically evaluate one aspect of this notion which, to our knowledge, has not been addressed before: direct connection between intensity of leisure practices, high culture awareness, and taste.

Using a sample of 450 high school students we find out that widely accepted measures of these variables demonstrate impressive lack of correlation even when various controls for cheating are implemented. Besides, two of the three measures are not related significantly to parental investments. The data seem even more surprising taking into account that Soviet time studies, carried out without knowledge of Bourdieu’s work, but in largely the same vein, produce results much better fitting with his theorizing. As Bourdieu predicts, holders of high cultural capital tend to form a homogamous status group and cultural consumption remains structured. Counter to Bourdieu, instead of one dominant taste we find a plurality of segmented tastes, covering different forms and species of art. Investment in developing taste for and familiarity with one of them does not imply familiarity with homological others. We will conclude with discussion of possible solutions of this puzzle.