The Study On Bourdieu's Theory Of Taste And Identity

"Taste",as an important philosophical category in the history of western philosophy,remains a controversy in philosophical category.Bourdieu,a contemporary French sociologist,combines the taste of legitimate culture with the taste of senses of everyday life,and explores the social disposition of the aesthetic taste of anthropology,which is totally different from the "aesthetic judgment" on the high culture proposed by Immanuel Kant.Using the theoretical tools,"capital","habitus","field",from the perspective of sociology,Bourdieu analyses the aesthetic taste and the choice of the style of life in the consumer society,simply but concretely.Another deeper theoretical reflection on the conformity of the individual identity of Bourdieu holds that all cultural symbols and choice of taste result from the competition for the social distinction and legitimate identity,which explores the disposition of the aesthetic taste and identity construction by means of the investigation to the choice of the cultural practice of everyday life.The dissertation is divided into four parts:Prolegomenon introduces the background of this research,which includes the studies of Bourdieu and his taste theory in domestic and foreign academia,as well as the research methods of this dissertation.Chapter One is about Bourdieu 's ideological origins and reflection on the western "taste" theory.Firstly,on the understanding that Bourdieu is a sociologist and a philosopher,this part elaborates the origin of his thoughts,and his persistent research methods of aesthetics and sociology,"Generated structuralism",which is based on the interrelationship,premised on the objectified subjectivity beyond the binary opposition,with generativity as the core and the epistemological reflection as the guarantee of his scientific research.Only in this way can the significance of philosophy to social practice in the discussion on “taste” be understood.Secondly,this part sorts out the meaning of "taste" from the “taste sense” of pre-aesthetic period to the “taste” of aesthetic period,and then to the post-aesthetic period,when Bourdieu reflects on his previous thoughts about the judgment of the subject aesthetic taste,andexplains that "taste" as a kind of sign of the class indicates the distinction and identity of the modern class from the perspective of sociology.Chapter Two describes the aesthetic disposition of taste judgment.This part analyses the "habitus","capital" and "field" in the Bourdieu's relational thinking mode.Capital is the basis of aesthetic taste,which includes economic capital,cultural capital and social capital.In particular,cultural capital is an important dimension of Bourdieu's taste research,in which the educational capital of schools and the cultural capital inherited define the territory and titles of the cultural aristocracy.Capital also defines the social space distribution of the social positions of agents.As the precondition and direct representation of aesthetic taste,habitus is the double structuralization of the structured structure and the structuring structure,and the root of all cultural practices as well as that of the aesthetic taste,and the double possibility of the style of life choosing and chosen.Field is the place where aesthetic tastes struggle with each other.The structure of field is composed of the power field,the capital distribution and the habitus of agents,where the aesthetic tastes of agents takes place.Each field has the relative autonomy,struggling for the legitimate status through the symbolic struggle continuously.All of these three theoretical tools constitute the pratical economy of aesthetic taste.Chapter Three emphasizes on the taste of distinction and identity."Taste" exists as a class taste sign in advance.Bourdieu divides France social class(taste)into a legitimate taste,middle-brow taste,and popular taste through the roughly correspondence to educational levels and social classes.The distinction of class/taste is a constant struggle of legalization for the status.The aristocracy of culture formed self-identity by showed egocentricity and the sense of distinction with legitimate taste.The middle class formed otherness-identity by pursed other symbol and the goodwill of tasty culture of the middle class.The popular class formed inevitable taste of helpless-identity because they are unable to master the cultural symbol decoding way.These three kinds of tastes are not the ideal tastes and identities of Bourdieu's,but the results of continuous motion through capital,habitus,field and so on.The ideal taste and identity of the theoretical thinking is the taste of the agents of autonomy,meanwhileconstruct self-otherness identity of autonomy-heteronomy.And only through unceasing reflection on the society and continuous disenchantment,can we achieve an ideal situation.