Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

Embed Size (px)

Citation preview

  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    1/28

    http://cus.sagepub.com/Cultural Sociology

    http://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341The online version of this article can be found at:

    DOI: 10.1177/17499755103877552011 5: 341 originally published online 25 March 2011Cultural Sociology

    Alan WardeCultural Hostility Re-considered

    Published by:

    http://www.sagepublications.com

    On behalf of:

    British Sociological Association

    can be found at:Cultural SociologyAdditional services and information for

    http://cus.sagepub.com/cgi/alertsEmail Alerts:

    http://cus.sagepub.com/subscriptionsSubscriptions:

    http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.navReprints:

    http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.navPermissions:

    http://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341.refs.htmlCitations:

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341http://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341http://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341http://www.sagepublications.com/http://www.britsoc.co.uk/http://cus.sagepub.com/cgi/alertshttp://cus.sagepub.com/cgi/alertshttp://cus.sagepub.com/subscriptionshttp://cus.sagepub.com/subscriptionshttp://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.navhttp://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.navhttp://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.navhttp://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341.refs.htmlhttp://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341.refs.htmlhttp://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341.refs.htmlhttp://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341.refs.htmlhttp://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.navhttp://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.navhttp://cus.sagepub.com/subscriptionshttp://cus.sagepub.com/cgi/alertshttp://www.britsoc.co.uk/http://www.sagepublications.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    2/28

    What is This?

    - Mar 25, 2011OnlineFirst Version of Record

    - Jul 14, 2011Version of Record>>

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://online.sagepub.com/site/sphelp/vorhelp.xhtmlhttp://online.sagepub.com/site/sphelp/vorhelp.xhtmlhttp://online.sagepub.com/site/sphelp/vorhelp.xhtmlhttp://cus.sagepub.com/content/early/2011/02/07/1749975510387755.full.pdfhttp://cus.sagepub.com/content/early/2011/02/07/1749975510387755.full.pdfhttp://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341.full.pdfhttp://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://online.sagepub.com/site/sphelp/vorhelp.xhtmlhttp://cus.sagepub.com/content/early/2011/02/07/1749975510387755.full.pdfhttp://cus.sagepub.com/content/5/3/341.full.pdf
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    3/28

    Cultural HostilityRe-considered

    Alan WardeUniversity of Manchester, UK

    AbstractIt is often remarked that dislikes are more revealing of taste than likes. The evidential basis of this

    insight, which can be found in the work of Bourdieu (1984) and of Douglas (1996), who called

    it cultural hostility, is slight. This paper specifies and evaluates the thesis, the cultural hostility

    thesis, that people share strong, symbolically significant, dislikes which function to demarcate

    cultural boundaries between antagonistic social groups. I examine progressively more precisely

    specified versions of the thesis and, using data from a survey of cultural practice in Britain, apply

    different operationalizations in order to estimate the prevalence of cultural hostility. I show

    that: expressed dislikes are probably not the primary indicator of meaningful social boundaries;

    evidence for overt generalized cultural hostility is relatively weak; even the best indicators ofhostility suggest limited antagonism; class differences are evident, but more because cultural

    omnivorousness has become a principle of good taste than as an expression of condescension or

    resentment. Indications of cultural hostility can be found, but they operate in a restricted manner,

    revolving around axes not only of class but also generation and gender. I conclude that a strong

    cultural hostility thesis is not readily applicable to contemporary Britain.

    Keywordscultural capital, cultural classification, cultural hostility, cultural omnivorousness dislikes, social

    class, social divisions, taste, United Kingdom

    Introduction: The Cultural Hostility Thesis

    Tastes (i.e. manifested preferences) are the practical affirmation of an inevitable difference.

    It is no accident that, when they have to be justified, they are asserted purely negatively, by

    the refusal of other tastes. In matters of taste, more than anywhere else, all determination is

    negation; and tastes are perhaps first and foremost distastes, disgust provoked by horror or

    visceral intolerance (sick-making) of the tastes of others. De gustibus non est disputandum:

    not because tous les gouts sont dans la nature, but because each taste feels itself to be

    Article

    Corresponding author:

    Alan Warde, University of Manchester, UK.

    Email: [email protected]

    Cultural Sociology

    5(3) 341366

    The Author(s) 2010Reprints and permission: sagepub.

    co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav

    DOI: 10.1177/1749975510387755cus.sagepub.com

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    4/28

    342 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    natural and so it almost is, being a habitus which amounts to rejecting others as unnatural

    and therefore vicious. Aesthetic intolerance can be terribly violent. Aversion to different life-

    styles is perhaps one of the strongest barriers between the classes; class endogamy is evidence

    of this (Bourdieu, 1984: 56).

    Pierre Bourdieus observation is intuitively plausible and sociologically appealing.

    Everyday conversations include strongly expressed admissions of detestation of goods

    and behaviours of forms of dress, the foods of other nations, the dietary habits of other

    classes, manners and morals. Other social scientists have endorsed the claim. For exam-

    ple, Mary Douglas (1996: 81, 104) suggested that Consumption behaviour is continu-

    ously and pervasively inspired by cultural hostility, concluding that Shopping is an

    agonistic struggle to define not what one is, but what one is not. There is here a strong

    thesis that powerfully held aversions define the most significant boundaries between

    antagonistic social groups. However, neither author developed the idea substantively ormethodologically. Their claims were extrapolations from a few exemplary incidents used

    to illustrate their general theoretical positions on the cultural origins of social divisions.

    Yet the thesis is relevant to a wide range of contemporary sociological concerns, includ-

    ing the coherence of cultural preferences, the relationship between lifestyle and identity,

    the association of social divisions and cultural taste, the capacity for cultural judgments

    to perpetrate and perpetuate social divisions, the current influence of class in relation to

    other divisions, sub-cultural formation and the pertinence of cultural omnivorousness. If

    we are interested in social classification, and to the extent that we believe cultural taste

    to be central, understanding dislikes is a potentially powerful avenue. Most sociologistswould share with Bourdieu a suspicion that judgments about cultural items can conceal

    evaluations of the people who espouse them. First, dislikes potentially pinpoint group

    hostility and division. Second, they suggest a technique for sociologists more effectively

    to identify pertinent boundaries. Finally, they promise to reveal cultural taste as a power-

    ful force for discrimination, discoverable in phenomena which sociologists rarely access.

    Neither Bourdieu nor Douglas attempted a systematic empirical corroboration of their

    claims. True, Bourdieus (1984) use of structural oppositions and of multiple correspon-

    dence analysis implicitly draw upon a model of mutually opposed preferences.

    Nevertheless little empirical research has critically evaluated the thesis and few havesought explicitly to prove the importance of dislikes. Two exceptions are Bryson (1996)

    and Wilk (1997) whose innovative contributions on matters of distaste have, disappoint-

    ingly, received little subsequent attention.

    Rick Wilk (1997:175) claimed that distastes, aversions, and dislikes are much more

    socially diagnostic than positive desires. He made a strong, abstract and plausible case for

    the predominant importance of aversions and avoidances and showed that they matter

    empirically with respect to both music and food in Belize. In partial critique of Bourdieu

    (1997: 184), who, he asserted, was overwhelmingly concerned with patterns of liking, he

    urged: The key point is that taste and distaste do not form simple complementary pairs;

    taste cannot be seen simply as the inversion, opposite, or mirror of distaste in forming

    social boundaries. Wilk continued by saying that in Belize people were not enthused

    about their likes, which were fairly uniform; it was rare that anyone would pick an unusual

    favourite. Hence, he found few clear relationships between specific tastes and any of my

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    5/28

    Warde 343

    social, income, class or ethnic variables (Wilk 1997: 187). It was only through greater

    diversity that richer people of higher social classes were distinguished by their likes. But

    distastes were more distinctive and were associated with socio-demographic position. He

    noted as typical, that while liking Country and Western music was fairly widespread

    across all groups, dislikes were concentrated. For example, dislike of classical music washighly concentrated among poorer groups. Consequently, he examined a range of cultural

    items in terms of both how much they were liked and disliked. On this basis he identified

    four contrasting bundles of symbolic cultural items, which he described, not entirely

    transparently, as orthodox, conservative, enclavist and heterodox. Acknowledging that

    Belize is more heterogeneous and less hierarchical than France in tastes, he found it dif-

    ficult to corroborate his thesis because there has been almost no systematic empirical

    work on distastes and dislikes in developed countries (Wilk 1997:191). He concluded

    that at this point more empirical research on the relationships between tastes and dis-

    tastes, passions and aversions is urgently needed (Wilk 1997: 193).Bethany Bryson (1996) examined the musical dislikes of the American population.

    Partly inspired by the debate about the cultural omnivore (cited by Peterson, 1992 and

    2005), she was concerned to understand the extent and pattern of cultural tolerance in the

    USA. She analyzed reported dislikes of 18 musical genres in the US General Social

    Survey of 1993. She showed that people of higher status had broader tastes: highly edu-

    cated people in the United States are more musically tolerant, but not indiscriminately

    so (Bryson 1996: 895). Such people exhibited a patterned tolerance, with a greater

    dislike of those genres preferred by the least educated (namely rap, heavy metal, country

    and gospel). Their antagonism, she concluded, was not towards ethnic minorities buttowards the working class, a reordering of group boundaries which trades race for class.

    She thus attributed to them what she called multicultural capital, which was effective

    as a form of cultural capital, its corollary being greater civic and political tolerance. She

    also noted that for the educated, exclusion of low-status music genres is stronger than

    identification with high-status genres (Bryson 1996: 894). Reflecting on her results she

    noted that the variance explained in the number of musical genres disliked by her regres-

    sion model was modest and mused that this was almost certainly because dislikes could

    not be entirely explained by their potential to highlight significant social boundaries. She

    therefore called for more cross national research (Bryson 1996: 896). Overall she suc-ceeded in showing that dislikes are selective and meaningful; that the middle class have

    fewer dislikes but still their main dislikes are for predominantly working class genres;

    that tolerance is itself a principle of cultural selection; and that there is a process of sym-

    bolic boundary marking involved. Taste is a form of symbolic message. However, her

    account dealt solely with musical genres in the US and, as she acknowledged, research

    on other fields and in other countries was required.

    Neither Brysons nor Wilks calls for more research have been answered. This is dis-

    appointing because both appeared to uncover a general significance in dislikes as a key

    qualification to the cultural omnivore thesis and a supreme indicator of symbolic bound-

    aries, respectively. Hence, a highly pertinent and powerful thesis about the social role of

    taste has languished. The strong thesis might run as follows. People exhibit (very) strong

    and meaningful cultural dislikes, which are apparent in many situations, including when

    shopping and while assessing the lifestyles of others. These dislikes help form, and allow

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    6/28

    344 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    self and others to draw, meaningful (and recognizable) social boundaries. The meaning

    may arise from the nature of the items themselves, or from their association with people

    and groups with different levels of status. Boundaries drawn upon dislikes will be more

    meaningful or decisive than those formed from positive preferences. Patterns of dislikes

    will be socially differentiated, particularly by class, but also by ethnic (and perhapsother) affiliations. Social differentiation may find its expression in a number of ways, for

    example, through the extent of dislikes, or the disliking of particular items, perhaps inter-

    preted in terms of their legitimacy. Finally, the dislike of cultural products entails dislik-

    ing, or thinking badly of, other people who do like them, it being the dislike of items to

    which other opposing groups are particularly attached that serves to mark such boundar-

    ies. As Bryson (1996: 885) put it, individuals use cultural taste to reinforce symbolic

    boundaries between themselves and categories of people they dislike, which is perhaps

    the most powerful definition of cultural hostility. In this form the thesis proposes that the

    passing of negative judgements upon aesthetic preferences for cultural can discloseantagonistic social groups aligned on opposite sides of a symbolic boundary. As such it

    concerns products rather than practices, judgments of value rather than simple empirical

    associations, and aesthetic rather than moral standards, all in relation to relevant social

    divisions.

    Matters of taste have been, and probably still are, mostly considered by sociologists

    in relation to social class, as with the authors considered above. However, their under-

    standings of the effect of class differ. For Bourdieu, the upper middle and the working

    classes are equally mutually opposed to each other, disliking those activities and traits

    which the other class embraces. If not entirely explicitly, because he paid it limited atten-tion, Bourdieu suggested that the working class especially dislikes legitimate items asso-

    ciated with the dominant classes. For Bryson, influenced by the omnivore debate, the

    middle class is generally tolerant of working class culture, but retains a number of sym-

    bolically marked aversions. Wilk observed class differences also, and that the middle

    class has fewer aversions hence his neat hypothesis that upward social mobility is more

    a process of eliminating dislikes than acquiring new likes. However, in the context of

    Belize at least, ethnicity was more important. National and ethnic, and perhaps genera-

    tional and gender divisions also, are candidates for significant boundary demarcations

    based upon dislikes.

    Examining Dislikes

    To progress the debate, this paper first of all presents another comparative case, describ-

    ing patterns of dislike as revealed in a study of the UK which collected relevant data on

    the cultural tastes of the population. Conducted in 2003, the study comprised focus-

    group discussions, a national survey, face-to-face household interviews with some of the

    survey respondents and also some personal interviews with members of the British elite.1

    The qualitative components of the research design threw up some examples relevant

    to the cultural hostility thesis. Aesthetic revulsion was expressed in negative sentiments

    about cultural products. For example, Reality TV brought a Chief Executive Officer of a

    major multinational corporation to say, Ill walk out of the room if my son has got Big

    Brother on or any of these bloody things where they vote for people who then get kicked

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    7/28

    Warde 345

    off. I literally you know, walk out of the room and go read a book or get away from it, I

    cant handle it, right. I hate them, right with a vengeance. But expressions of dislike

    were usually mild, measured and qualified judgments of a kind consistent with the aes-

    thetic disinterestedness said to characterise the dominant cultural groups, and some-

    times even apologetic. For instance, a senior university manager said I cant stand soapsand things, I mean I can see their function, and indeed my daughter says theyre

    absolutely crucial, theyre important socially and I totally accept that.

    As Bourdieu insisted, because aesthetic disinterest often masks social interest it is

    difficult empirically to confirm that the reason for an expressed dislike is its association

    with another social group. Interviews and focus groups proved ineffective instruments

    for uncovering such connections. People typically do not attribute their distaste for an

    item to their dislike of the sort of person who does like it. The closest approximation

    came from a 48 year old female university graduate who, in an interview, said, I hate

    that kind of hip hop stuff, I really hate it. When asked why by the interviewer, shecontinued:

    Im embarrassed to tell you! I really, really hate it because I really hate those guys in those

    baseball hats because I really hate baseball hats and if I could have something in Room 101,2

    that would be the top of my list, I would ban them from the world. I hate those baseball caps so

    as soon as those guys come on and theyve got them, they look as though theyre actually

    thinking of putting one on Im totally appalled by the whole thing.

    Her alienation is expressed with respect to the clothing of artists rather than the music or

    people who like the music. People may dislike items on purely aesthetic and perhaps

    autobiographical grounds without any necessary consequence for the marking of social

    boundaries.

    However, sometimes boundaries were drawn in a way that suggested group antago-

    nism. Tastes may differentiate both within and between groups. According to Bourdieu

    (1996), struggles for succession within the cultural field operate on the basis of attempts

    by a rising fraction to find new cultural forms and items which they can establish as

    legitimate in a challenge to current orthodoxy. Dislikes will often therefore mark sym-

    bolic boundaries within the dominant class. One focus group discussion threw up a vivid

    instance of the same effect within the working class. Asked for examples of bad taste,a group of skilled manual workers in South Wales nominated Mushes, who were

    described as wearing shell suits, dodgy trainers, 15 years old with kids, big gold

    chains round their necks, massive earrings, lots of gold, bleached blond hair.

    Mush is the Welsh term for Chav, a currently maligned section of the working class.

    The most memorable instance ofbetween-group demarcation occurred when a young

    skilled working class focus group discussed the theatre:

    Wayne: Yeah there is too much judging you [referring to the moderator] are saying

    what kind of people would go to the theatre? and we would, like not throughany fault of anybodys, but if we went to the theatre and watched them walking

    out wed be judging them as geeks.

    Kev: And theyd be judging us.

    Wayne: Yeah, like, Look at the piss-heads.

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    8/28

    346 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    Kate: Yes, theyd be judging.

    Moderator: Whats your definition of a geek, just roughly?

    Wayne: Just somebody who doesnt know how to have any fun.

    Steve: Doesnt seem to have fun like. Just does boring things.

    Kev: Doesnt like a laugh.Daz: Just someone whos opposite to us.

    Wayne: Probably somebody whos quite happy in themselves but wed call them a geek

    and theyd call us piss-heads or a bum or something.

    These were, however, exceptional instances of direct and explicit association between

    consumption and social status, a couple of instances revealed by more than a hundred

    hours of recorded discussion. Note also that the first example is as much about embodied

    appearance as it is about cultural products, while the latter concerns an imagined cultural

    event, theatre-going, rather than an aesthetic judgment.

    At the outset, then, we cannot assume, as Bourdieu and Douglas suggested, that all

    dislikes are motivated by cultural hostility or that they necessarily have a social basis.

    Probably some are, and others not. Manifestly, cultural hostility does occur, but a key

    issue, as raised by Wilk and Bryson, is itsprevalence. I therefore explore systematically,

    using survey data, the evidence for the strong cultural hostility thesis, asking whether

    expressed dislikes of specific cultural products generally symbolise antagonism between

    social groups. Data and methods are described in section 3. I then successively opera-

    tionalize alternative versions of the cultural hostility thesis regarding clustering, volume,

    structure and specificity of dislikes. Section 4 describes the rather nuanced and complex

    dislikes of the British population. Section 5 asks whether dislikes are strongly structuredsocially whether some groups have more dislikes than other, and whether social groups

    defined by socio-demographic characteristics differ in their negative tastes. Section 6

    classifies some cultural items in terms of their legitimacy in order to explore whether

    reciprocal hostility operated around items which Bourdieusian theory would identify as

    particularly strategic. Section 7 re-sorts the same items in respect of the degree to which

    they are controversial within the whole population, searching in a different manner for

    items with specific significance in marking social boundaries.

    Data and Method

    This paper focuses on responses to a selection of questions in a national random sample

    survey of the UK in 2003 about respondents cultural tastes.3 Some questions intention-

    ally tapped both likes and dislikes regarding particular artists, works and genres.4 The

    survey covered in some detail various domains across and beyond the fine arts so was not

    restricted, as were Bryson and Wilk, to material on music and food, allowing a broader

    estimation of how much dislikes reveal.

    Some of the questions about taste preferences asked about dislikes in ways which did

    not require a positive response, respondents being able to register indifference or lack offamiliarity with items. These questions, 40 in all, had three different formats. The first

    invited people to rank genres of music and books on a scale of 1 to 7. The second asked

    if a named painter or musical work was known and liked or disliked. In the third, the

    respondent was asked whether s/he would make a point of listening to a named TV

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    9/28

    Warde 347

    programme or watching a film by a particular director. Respondents were not forced to

    record any dislikes among their answers to these 40 questions. The responses coded to

    indicate dislikes were as follows:

    1) book genres: score on 6 or 7 on a seven point scale from like to dislike for sevengenres of writing

    2) music genres: score on 6 or 7 on a seven point scale from like to dislike for eight

    genres of music

    named musical works; have listened to and did not like eight pieces of music

    3) named artists: have seen works by seven painters, which were disliked

    4) national TV: would not make a point of watching four specific programmes

    5) film directors: would not make a point of watching the work of six film

    directors.

    Thus genres, works and producers were addressed. For the sake of clarity, because

    responses to questions about genre differ systematically from the other two, I refer to

    the second and third as products and use the term cultural items when referring to

    all three.

    For purposes of statistical analysis, the independent variables employed were age,

    gender, region, household type, population density and income (quartiles). Also included

    is self-identified ethnic group, which owing to relatively small sample size was catego-

    rised as White-English, White-Celtic (Irish, Scottish or Welsh), White-Other and not-

    White. Education comprises five levels: no qualifications; GCSE (school examination atage 16); A-level (school examination at age 18); technical college and professional quali-

    fications; and university degree. An earlier analysis using Multiple Correspondence

    Analysis (see Le Roux et al., 2008) determined, at least with respect to cultural participa-

    tion and taste, that the clearest class boundaries lay between the professional-executive

    class (NS-SeC 13, i.e. excluding lower managerial workers), an intermediate class

    (NS-SeC 48), and a working class (NS-SeC 912) comprising lower technical and

    lower supervisory workers, semi-routine workers and routine workers.5

    The Pattern of Dislikes

    The range of dislikes

    Table 1 lists responses to the 40 questions posed about dislikes. The items range from

    the very common to the comparatively rare.6

    Column A indicates the percentage of

    people who recognized a given item. Column B shows the percentage who disliked it,

    column C the percentage positively disposed towards it. Column D is the difference

    between B and C.

    Only two products were disliked by more than half the respondents (Table1, columnB): 58 % said that they would definitely not make a point of watching the Queens

    Christmas broadcast and 51% would not watch general election coverage. A number of

    products were disliked by less than 10% of the population. Some of these are arcane

    items; if people do not know of them they are unlikely to record dislike. These include

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    10/28

    348 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    Table 1. Knowledge, likes and dislikes of 40 cultural items

    A B C B-C

    Know % Dislike % Like %

    Film directors

    Spielberg 95 12 44 -32Hitchcock 95 24 34 -10Bergman 57 26 7 +19Campion 17 8 2 +6Almodvar 8 3 3 0Rathnam 6 4 1 +3

    Musical works

    Chicago 92 17 65 -48

    Four Seasons 80 6 56-

    50Oops 77 39 26 +13Wonderwall 74 14 47 -33Stan 65 18 31 -13Mahler Symphony No.5 47 6 19 -13Kind of Blue 30 3 13 -10Einstein on the Beach 17 3 3 0

    TV programmes

    World Cup 99 34 44 -10Grand National 97 47 26 +21

    General Election 98 51 24+

    27Queens ChristmasBroadcast

    98 58 17 +41

    Artists

    Van Gogh 81 14 67 -53Lowry 68 13 55 -42Turner 57 7 50 -43Picasso 77 28 49 -21Warhol 55 34 21 +13Kahlo 6 2 4 -2Emin 21 18 3 +15

    Musical genresClassical 100 33 29 +4Rock 96 38 27 +11Country and Western 99 35 25 +10Urban 95 43 18 +25Modern jazz 99 48 12 +36World 97 48 12 +36Electronic 93 58 11 +47Heavy Metal 97 67 11 +56

    Literary genres

    Biography 99 23 39 -16Detective, thrillers 98 27 30 -3Romance 99 45 21 +24Self Help 99 49 16 +33Science Fiction 99 61 14 +47Modern Literature 97 42 14 +28Religious 99 66 9 +57

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    11/28

    Warde 349

    the painting of Frida Kahlo (2 per cent dislike), films of Pedro Almodvar (2 per cent),

    Phillip Glasss Einstein on the Beach (3 per cent), Miles Daviss Kind of Blue (3 per

    cent), films of Mani Rathnam (4 per cent), and Mahlers Fifth Symphony (6 per cent).

    However, Vivaldis The Four Seasons (6 per cent) and the painting of J.S.Turner (7 per

    cent) were also very little disliked despite being widely known, suggesting that they areparticularly inoffensive. Many more dislikes of genres were recorded: religious books

    (66 per cent), science fiction (61 per cent) and self-help (49 per cent) among literature,

    and among musical genres heavy metal (67 per cent disliked), electronic (58 per cent),

    modern jazz and world music (48 per cent each) and urban (43 per cent). Note that one

    reason for this difference between named product and genre was that very few respond-

    ents failed to recognise the genres whereas, for example, since only 8 % of respondents

    had heard of Almodvar, no more than that proportion could express dislike. Clearly,

    Britons are not shy about expressing dislike of cultural items.

    Patterns of dislikes

    In order to discover whether there were any strong patterns to the dislikes a Principal

    Components Analysis of the 40 items was conducted (See Table 2). If the items on the

    scale had fallen into a small number of mutually exclusive groups we might conclude

    that there were some widely shared combinations of dislikes which might form the

    boundaries between hostile parties. However, 13 factors had an Eigenvalue greater than

    1 and together they explained only 51 % of the variance. The most powerful explained a

    mere 5.3 % of the variance. This result could be the effect of the heterogeneity of theitems included in the analysis.7 However, most components were primarily characterized

    by dislike of items restricted to a particular category TV, film, visual art and reading.

    The implication is that some people are averse to complete fields of activity and probably

    do not engage in the practice. Occasionally, a factor gave some inkling of class hostility,

    between middle class fractions and between middle and working classes. The third factor

    drew together dislike of biographies and modern literature, classical music, and the gen-

    eral election broadcast on TV with a liking for the modern art of Emin and Warhol and

    for modern jazz. Such a pattern might be thought to fit a rebellious or youthful section of

    the middle class hostile to older, established and traditional middle class preferences.The fifth factor exhibited a dislike of Oops, country and western music, the Queens

    Christmas broadcast and Eminems Stan, and also showed, at a slightly lower level of

    significance, likings for reading biographies and for Mahler. This might represent middle

    class rejection of lower-class tastes. Overall, however, the patterns do nothing to cor-

    roborate a claim that distastes cluster clearly around recognizable symbolic boundaries.

    The Structure of Dislikes

    Volume of dislikesWe would anticipate that some people will have more dislikes than others. The omnivo-

    rousness thesis, invoked by Bryson for instance, suggests that people of higher socio-

    economic status, and with more education and income, will tend to have a wider range of

    likes and, as a corollary, a smaller range of dislikes. Omnivores are said to be more

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    12/28

    350 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    Table 2. Patterns of dislikes. Principal components analysis (Varimax with Kaiser Normalization).Components with Eigenvalue greater than 1. Indicating items loading at .30 or greater

    Components

    1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

    Activity

    Queens Christmasbroadcast

    .50

    General election .50 .31

    Grand National .75

    World Cup .69

    Bergman .33

    Hitchcock .59Spielberg .47

    Campion .70

    Rathnam .69

    Almodvar .65

    Wonderwall .63

    Oops .58

    Stan .40

    Chicago .44 .40

    Four Seasons .70

    Symphony no 5 .52

    Kind of blue .66

    Einstein .74

    Religious books .61

    Science-fiction .47 .50

    Self-help books .60

    Romances .63

    Modern literature .40

    Thrillers, .36 .55

    Biographies .50 .38Heavy metal .41 .62

    Electronic dance .66

    World music .64

    Modern jazz .31 .31

    Urban, R&B .71

    Rock, inc Indie .40 .50

    Country and Western .50 -.29 .33

    Classical music .47

    Warhol -.39 .36

    Picasso .76

    Emin -.68

    Van Gogh .67

    Lowry .66

    Turner .68

    Kahlo .40 .34

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    13/28

    Warde 351

    tolerant than the middle class of earlier periods who would have rejected popular cultural

    forms associated with lower social classes. However, most explorations of the omnivore

    thesis have had to rely on information about what people like, rather than what they dis-

    like (Bryson, 1996, is the exception). And since likes and dislikes are not necessarily

    socially symmetrical it remained possible that omnivores have both more dislikes as wellas more likes.

    A simple additive scale of all 40 items was created to calculate variation in the volume

    of individual dislikes. Again, the heterogeneity of the items means that the scale should

    be treated cautiously.8 One person had not a single dislike. The maximum number of

    dislikes was 33. There was a normal distribution of scores. The mean number of dislikes

    was 15, the median 16. The lowest quartile scored 11 or less; the highest quartile 20 or

    more. Note that, in response to the same set of items, people recorded more dislikes than

    likes; the mean number of likes was nine compared with 15 dislikes.

    Cross-tabulation of respondents scores on this scale with some socio-demographicvariables showed that:

    1) the higher the social class, the fewer dislikes were expressed;

    2) men had fewer dislikes than women;

    3) the group self-identifying as non-white had fewer dislikes than any white group;

    4) the more education a respondent had, the more likely they were to have few

    dislikes;

    5) and the young had fewer dislikes than the elderly.

    In order to explore these relationships more closely we applied Poisson regression analy-

    sis to log scores on the scale.9 Much less variance in the volume of aversions could be

    explained statistically than for equivalent scales for cultural participation or likes (see

    Gayo-Cal and Warde, 2009). The overall power of the explanation was weak, implying

    that the extent of aversions is only lightly grounded in social group memberships of any

    sort. The model showed a significant effect for higher education. Those with a university

    degree have fewer dislikes than the rest; those with A-level or technical qualifications

    have fewer than the less qualified, but significance level is only .10. Age was insignifi-

    cant, as was class, income and population density. There were weak relationships withregion, people living outside London having more dislikes, an effect statistically signifi-

    cant for the north and south of England and Scotland. Other effects reducing dislikes,

    significant at the .10 level, included belonging to the highest income quartile and being

    a man. The most significant relationship was that the least privileged ethnic groups, those

    identifying themselves as other than white, have significantlyfewerdislikes than others.

    This might just possibly be the phenomenon of cultural goodwill, described by Bourdieu

    (1984: 318372) as characteristic of the petit bourgeois in France, but perhaps more

    likely shows some commitment to the values of multiculturalism. However, it is also an

    artefact of the survey instrument. The questions asked, for reasons of space, did not tar-

    get in detail particular ethnic minority cultural traditions and presumably, therefore,

    items about which members felt most strongly. The Other group recognised signifi-

    cantly fewer products and since recognition is a pre-condition for expressing dislike,

    this, rather than tolerance per se, probably explains their answers. The tolerance of the

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    14/28

    352 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    Table 3. Factors influencing respondents volume of expressed dislikes: Poisson regressioncoefficients

    (Constant) B

    EducationGCSE, CSE, O-level, NVQ/SVQ level 1 or 2 -.032RSA/OCR Higher Diploma, City and Guilds Full T -.065*GCE A-level, Scottish Higher Grades, ONC -.051University/ CNAA Bachelor Degr., Master Deg/ PhD/ D.Phil -.097***Other qualifications -.134*

    Age

    Age .003Age squared .005

    Region

    North .093**Midlands .059Southern England .081*Wales .124**Scotland .129**Northern Ireland .076

    Type of household

    Single person household .019Unrelated adults household -.067*Couple dependent children -.020Couple non-dependent children .078*Lone parent dependent children -.061Lone parent non-dependent children .048Multi-family .064

    Social class

    Professional-executive -.004Intermediate .024Never worked -.057

    Sex

    Male -.032*Ethnic origin

    White-other British/Irish -.036White-other -.045Other origin -.208***

    Population density

    1.68/7.92 -.0307.93/25.26 .03325.27/41.26 .02541.27/185.22 .010

    Income

    2nd quartile -.030

    3rd quartile-

    .012High quartile -.048Number of cases 1564

    a Dependent Variable: scale of participationBaseline categories: level of education: no education qualifications; region: London; type of household:couple no children; social class: working class; sex: female; ethnic origin: white-English; population density:0/1.67; income: low quartile.* p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    15/28

    Warde 353

    educated (expressed as fewer dislikes, without prejudice to the question of whether they

    nevertheless despise some exceptionally symbolically significant items) is probably bet-

    ter attributed to an omnivorous orientation, an openness to diversity.10 On balance, Wilks

    findings about dislikes being more strongly associated with social position than likes are

    probably not valid for the UK.

    Social distribution of specific dislikes

    So far, the analysis of dislikes has provided little support for the cultural hostility thesis.

    However, it is essential to examine whether effective cultural hostility occurs in more

    contextually specific locations. Despite the absence of strong overall patterns in relation

    to volume of dislikes, the thesis might still be valid if cultural hostility were expressed

    primarily in relation to a limited number of items of exceptional symbolic significance.

    This section therefore examines the distribution of dislikes among specific social groups,examining three socio-demographic factors, class, gender and cohort.

    Table 4 shows the distribution of distastes across classes. There are very few items

    which a majority of any class dislikes, five in the professional-executive class and nine

    in the working class. Note that many items exhibit no class marking whatsoever. There

    is no general class hostility reflected by distastes. Nevertheless, some cultural items dis-

    criminate between classes, marking class boundaries and therefore potentially perform-

    ing a function of social classification. There are a number of items which the professionals

    and executives dislike much less than the working class the General Election broad-

    cast, modern literature, biographies, modern jazz, rock music and classical music. Theseitems are mostly genres of music and literature. There are three widely recognized items

    which the professional-executive class dislike more country and western music, and

    the art of Warhol and Emin. They also dislike other more rare items the films of

    Campion, Rathman and Almodovar, and Mahlers 5th symphony and GlasssEinstein on

    the Beach. While these items are more widely distributed across fields they are, with the

    exception of country and western music, specific products rather than genres. Thus, the

    professional-executive class, consistent with the omnivore thesis, rarely condemns entire

    genres, tending to find in most some redeeming items (Warde et al, 2007). Nevertheless,

    class differences do concentrate on particular items.There are fewer differences by gender than by class (see Table 5). There are no sig-

    nificant differences regarding film directors, musical works or artists, and only one for

    musical genres, women disliking heavy metal much more than do men. However, three

    of the TV programmes are more disliked by women, the two sports events and general

    election coverage. Women also dislike science fiction writing more. Only two forms are

    more disliked by men than women self-help books and, by a huge proportion, romantic

    fiction. It is, however, worth speculating whether, and in what sense, these indicate cul-

    tural hostility. There is little doubt that, in Britain in the 21 st century, football, horse rac-

    ing, heavy metal and science fiction are coded masculine, and that romantic fiction is

    coded feminine. A small number of items thus correspond with gender boundaries.

    However, whether womens dislike of heavy metal, or mens of romantic novels, is best

    understood as hostility to the other sex is debatable. It would be even less likely that such

    a claim could be advanced in relation to general election broadcasts or self-help books.

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    16/28

    354 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    Table 4. Taste (dislikes). Mean levels (percentages) of expressed dislike for 40 items and bysocial classes: professional-executive, intermediate and working class

    Activity Mean Professional-executive intermediate working Sig.

    Queens Christmas broadcast 58.3 57 56 61General election 50.6 34 48 61 ***Grand National 47.4 49 46 47Football World Cup 34.3 34 30 38 *Bergman 26.3 30 31 22 **Hitchcock 24.1 25 25 24Spielberg 12.4 11 13 12Campion 7.7 11 8 5 **Rathnam 3.6 5 3 2 ***Almodvar 3.3 5 4 1Wonderwall 13.8 13 13 15Oops 39.1 43 38 39Stan 17.8 19 16 18Chicago 17 14 19 18Four Seasons 6.1 7 7 5Mahler, Symphony no 5 6.1 9 7 4 *Kind of Blue 3.3 4 2 4Einstein on the Beach 2.7 5 1 2 *Religious books 66.4 67 65 69 *Science-fiction, fantasy andhorror

    60.8 60 63 61

    Self-help books 49.3 49 47 52Romances 45.1 50 41 46 *Modern literature 42.2 27 37 53 ***Thrillers, who-dunnits anddetective stories

    27.2 20 26 32 ***

    Biographies andautobiographies

    23.2 11 18 33 ***

    Heavy metal 66.9 62 64 72 **Electronic dance music,including techno and house

    57.9 66 58 55 **

    World music, includingReggae and Bhangra

    48.3 44 53 49 *

    Modern jazz 48.1 37 47 54 ***Urban, including Hip Hopand R&B

    42.8 42 45 43 *

    Rock, including Indie 37.5 32 35 42 *Country and Western 35.3 42 35 31 **Classical music, includingOpera

    33.3 19 30 42 ***

    Warhol 34.1 41 37 30 ***Picasso 27.9 25 33 27 ***Emin 17.8 32 23 7 ***Van Gogh 14.2 12 15 16 ***

    Lowry 12.9 17 13 11Turner 6.7 9 6 6Kahlo 1.8 2 1

    N= 1520 361 449 71023.1 % 28.7 % 45.4 %

    Chi-Square: *** < 0.001, ** < 0.01, * < 0.05

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    17/28

    Warde 355

    Table 6 records responses by three age cohorts. Compared to the average, the under-

    40s exhibit substantially greater dislike of four items watching the Queens Christmas

    broadcast, Oops, country and western music and classical music. They show much less

    dislike of science-fiction, of four genres of contemporary music and the paintings of

    Table 5. Taste (dislikes). Mean levels of disliking (percentages) of 40 items, and for men andwomen

    Items Mean Men Women Sig.

    Queens Christmas broadcast 58.3 60 57General election 50.6 44 56 ***Grand National 47.4 40 54 ***Football World Cup 34.3 16 50 ***Bergman 26.3 29 24Hitchcock 24.1 19 28 ***Spielberg 12.4 10 15 **Campion 7.7 10 6 *Rathnam 3.6 5 3 *Almodvar 3.3 3 4Wonderwall 13.8 13 14

    Oops 39.1 42 37Stan 17.8 16 19Chicago 17 17 17Four Seasons 6.1 7 5Mahler, Symphony no 5 6.1 5 7Kind of Blue 3.3 4 3Einstein 2.7 4 2Religious books 66.4 69 65Science-fiction, fantasy, horror 60.8 49 70 ***Self-help books 49.3 54 45 ***Romances 45.1 71 23 ***

    Modern literature 42.2 45 40 *Thrillers, detective stories 27.2 25 29Biographies and autobiographies 23.2 25 22Heavy metal 66.9 59 74 ***Electronic dance music, includingtechno and house

    57.9 58 58

    World music, inc. Reggae and Bhangra 48.3 45 51 *Modern jazz 48.1 45 51 *Urban, inc. Hip Hop and R&B 42.8 45 41Rock, including Indie 37.5 34 40 **Country and Western 35.3 34 36Classical music, including Opera 33.3 32 35Warhol 34.1 36 33Picasso 27.9 28 28Emin 17.8 17 18Van Gogh 14.2 14 15Lowry 12.9 14 13Turner 6.7 5 8 *Kahlo 1.8 1 2

    N= 1564 713 85145.6% 54.4%

    Chi-Square: *** < 0.001, ** < 0.01, * < 0.05

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    18/28

    356 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    Warhol and Picasso. For almost all of these items the over-60s register a significant

    and opposite taste. The differences between cohorts are substantial, although again there

    are items for which age makes no difference i.e. most of the painters, most of the film

    makers, most genres of literature and most of the classical music products. Music in

    Table 6. Taste (dislikes). Mean levels of disliking (percentages) of 40 items for three cohorts:aged 18-39, 40-60 and 61+

    Activity Mean 18-39 40-60 61+ Sig.

    Queens Christmas broadcast 58.3 69 61 38 ***General election 50.6 56 53 39 ***Grand National 47.4 54 48 37 ***Football World Cup 34.3 30 36 38 *Bergman 26.3 24 32 24 **Hitchcock 24.1 30 23 17 ***Spielberg 12.4 6 11 25 ***Campion 7.7 9 8 6Rathnam 3.6 4 4 3Almodvar 3.3 4 3 3Wonderwall 13.8 14 18 7 ***

    Oops 39.1 53 40 17 ***Stan 17.8 20 22 7 ***Chicago 17 17 21 11 **Four Seasons 6.1 7 6 5Symphony no 5 6.1 5 7 7Kind of Blue 3.3 4 3 3Einstein 2.7 3 2 3Religious books 66.4 70 65 63 *Science-fiction, fantasy and horror 60.8 46 63 81 ***Self-help books 49.3 45 45 62 ***Romances 45.1 44 44 49

    Modern literature 42.2 36 42 52 ***Thrillers, who-dunnits and detective stories 27.2 22 28 33 **Biographies and autobiographies 23.2 21 23 27Heavy metal 66.9 58 64 86 ***Electronic dance music, including technoand house

    57.9 41 68 69 ***

    World music, including Reggae and Bhangra 48.3 36 44 74 ***Modern jazz 48.1 44 49 53 *Urban, including Hip Hop and R&B 42.8 20 49 68 ***Rock, including Indie 37.5 25 32 65 ***Country and Western 35.3 53 30 17 ***Classical music, including Opera 33.3 47 29 19 ***Warhol 34.1 18 42 47 ***Picasso 27.9 15 32 41 ***Emin 17.8 16 19 18Van Gogh 14.2 14 14 14Lowry 12.9 11 16 11 *Turner 6.7 9 6 3 **Kahlo 1.8 2 1 3

    N= 1563 590 588 38537.7% 37.7% 24.6%

    Chi-Square: *** < 0.001, ** < 0.01, * < 0.05

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    19/28

    Warde 357

    Table 7. Taste (likes). Mean levels of liking 40 items and genres. Persons with degrees and noqualifications as a percentage of those who express positive preference

    Activity Mean Those withdegrees as a %of all who likethe activity (b)

    Those with noqualifications as a %of all who like theactivity (c)

    Ratio(b/c)

    LegitimateKahlo 3.8 59 1.6 36.87Almodvar 2.6 73.2 4.9 14.93Warhol 21.8 42.5 8.5 5Modern literature 13.5 45 11.8 3.81Campion 2.2 54.3 14.3 3.79Emin 2.9 56.5 15.2 3.71Einstein 3.3 43.4 15.1 2.87

    Symphony no 5 19.3 41.1 15.9 2.58Kind of Blue 12.7 40.7 16.1 2.52Heavy metal 10.8 29.6 11.8 2.50Rock, including Indie 26.7 32.8 14.8 2.21Stan 31.1 26.4 13 2.03Wonderwall 46.6 27.5 13.7 2.01

    CommonScience-fiction, fantasy andhorror

    14.4 28 14.2 1.97

    Urban, including Hip Hopand R&B

    18.8 23.8 12.2 1.95

    Picasso 48.8 33.1 17 1.94

    Four Seasons 55.7 32.8 18.8 1.74Biographies and autobiographies 38.6 28.2 17.2 1.63Van Gogh 67.3 29.3 20.1 1.45Turner 50.5 32 22.4 1.42Self-help books 16.2 26.9 19.4 1.38Classical music, including Opera 29 33.9 25.3 1.33General election 24.3 32.5 26.2 1.24World music, including Reggaeand Bhangra

    12 27.5 22.8 1.20

    Electronic dance music,including techno and house

    10.9 21.2 18.2 1.16

    Modern jazz 12 27.1 23.9 1.13Lowry 54.5 26.5 25.5 1.03Rathnam 0.6 10 10 1

    UnauthorisedReligious books 8.5 26.5 27.3 0.97Thrillers, who-dunnits anddetective stories

    29.7 24.8 26.7 0.92

    Chicago 64.7 24.4 27.9 0.87Oops 26.4 20.5 22.2 0.92Football World Cup 44.4 21.4 26 0.82Spielberg 43.5 16.7 26.7 0.62Bergman 6.7 24 41.3 0.58

    Romances 20.5 17.1 30.2 0.56Grand National 25.6 19.3 38 0.50Hitchcock 33.8 17.6 35.6 0.49Queens Christmas broadcast 16.9 16.3 39.8 0.40Country and Western 25.3 12.6 47.9 0.26

    N= 1564 366 41923.4% 26.8%

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    20/28

    358 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    particular separates out generations, as do tastes in television. Analysts of generational

    conflict have often alighted on cultural preferences as central, so this may be some cor-

    roborating indication of cultural hostility.

    That patterns of association are often non-existent and in most instances relativelyweak is not yet sufficient to dismiss the cultural hostility thesis. Though not explicitly

    proposed by advocates of the thesis, cultural hostility could be a central social mecha-

    nism even if only a small number of items, of high symbolic significance, were strategi-

    cally marked. Bryson postulated this about heavy metal music and middle class distaste

    for white working class musical genres in the US. Indeed, on reflection, it would be

    surprising if every item performed a significant symbolic and classificatory function. To

    identify such critical markers entails isolating items about which opposed groups have

    strongly contrary feelings. In the next two sections I devise alternative techniques to

    examine the reciprocal relationship between likes and dislikes.

    Legitimacy and Class

    A contested relationship to legitimate, or high, culture has been central to sociological

    analysis of taste. The notion of legitimate culture was critical for Bourdieu because it is

    Legitimate Common Unauthorised

    Kahlo Science-fiction, fantasy and horror Religious books

    Almodvar Urban, including Hip Hop and R&B Thrillers, who-dunnits,

    detective stories

    Warhol Picasso Oops

    Modern literature Four Seasons Chicago

    Campion Biographies and autobiographies Football World Cup

    Emin Van Gogh Spielberg

    Einstein on the Beach Turner Bergman

    Symphony no 5 Self-help books Romances

    Kind of blue Classical music, including Opera Grand National

    Heavy metal General election Hitchcock

    Rock World music, Reggae and Bhangra Queens Christmas

    broadcast

    Stan Electronic dance music, techno

    and house

    Country and Western

    Wonderwall Modern jazz

    Lowry

    Rathnam

    Figure 1. Controversy, legitimacy and classItems in bold are significantly more disliked by the professional-executive class than the working classItems in bold italics are significantly more disliked by the working class than the professional-executive class

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    21/28

    Warde 359

    the fount of cultural capital, capital arising from sharing in taste communities accredited

    by cultural institutions, foremost among them universities. A bowdlerized version of his

    position, nevertheless fairly widely canvassed, anticipates that those attached to a domi-

    nant culture, a dominant class, will like legitimate and dislike vulgar items, while the

    working class, having a taste for the necessary, will explicitly dislike, or perhaps beindifferent to, the legitimate and favour the vulgar. In this scenario reciprocal hostility is

    expressed directly across a social boundary the dominant class dislikes what the work-

    ing class likes, and vice versa. Schematically, however, four possible conditions are con-

    sistent with the basic premise that legitimate items cause social division: the dominant

    group like the legitimate and dislike the unauthorized (condescension); the dominant

    group like the legitimate but also like the unauthorized (omnivorousness); the subordi-

    nate group likes the unauthorized and dislikes the legitimate (resentment); the subordi-

    nate group likes the unauthorized, but is indifferent to, the legitimate (accommodation).11

    The first and third conditions are ones which might generate overt antagonism, produc-ing or structuring cultural hostility.

    In order to explore the relational properties of likes and dislikes the 40 items were re-

    sorted hierarchically in terms of their legitimacy. I reason that it is those items dispropor-

    tionately preferred by people with greatest exposure to educational institutions which

    have greatest legitimacy. This is a conventional understanding of legitimacy based on the

    positive preferences of the custodians of cultural taste. Table 7 describes differences

    between graduates and the unqualified with respect to the items that they say they like. It

    emphasizes the meaning of the items, expressing the views of the most and least edu-

    cated as a ratio relative to the opinions of the whole sample.12

    Items can thus be placedon a continuum of legitimacy based upon the relative preferences of people with univer-

    sity degrees when compared with those without any educational qualifications a prac-

    ticable and defensible way of constructing a measure of legitimacy (see further, Gayo-Cal

    and Warde, 2009).13 So, for example, Table 7 column D shows that liking classical music

    or biographies were not marked as highly legitimate in 2004, irrespective of their status

    thirty years earlier. For convenience of discussion, I have partitioned items into three

    groups.Legitimate items are those which are more than twice as often preferred by grad-

    uates. Those which are unauthorisedare less likely to be liked by graduates than the

    unqualified. Those which are common are the remainder.To estimate the role of class, consider Figure 1, which identifies items, ranked in

    terms of their legitimacy, which are disproportionately disliked by the professional-exec-

    utive and the working classes. The working class expresses more dislikes. They also

    register more dislikes of legitimate items than do the professional-executive class of

    unauthorised ones. If dislike by a subordinate group of those legitimate items which are

    liked by a dominant group indicates class resentment, then there is more resentment than

    condescension. Working class members may be drawing boundaries between themselves

    and others by attributing preferences14 for example for classical music and modern

    literature to people who, without warrant, claim superior status. This pattern may

    indeed represent cultural hostility. However, half of the disputed items are from popular

    music. We might guess that this is some measure of the existence of class boundaries

    among younger people. The only unauthorised item disliked by the professional-execu-

    tive class, country and western music, might be interpreted as a marker of a reviled taste,

    although actually only 11 % more of the professional-executive class dislike it than do

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    22/28

    360 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    the working class. All the other legitimate items disliked by the professionals are ones

    known to only a small minority and apparently reflect internal divisions or competition

    within the professional-executive class. Thus the evidence for class condescension is

    weak and, consequently, that for the prevalence of an omnivorous orientation among the

    professional-executive class commensurately stronger.

    Culture and controversy

    The previous section implies that reciprocal class antagonism along an axis of legitimacy

    is not great. Indeed, most controversy occurs over items within the legitimate category.

    One might therefore be tempted to conclude that taste has little significant impact on

    social relations. However, a final redoubt for the cultural hostility thesis remains. Perhaps

    a more complicated pattern of reciprocal antagonisms exists. According to Wilk, likes and

    dislikes are not necessarily symmetrical. Knowing what an individual in Belize liked didnot effectively predict what they would dislike. It was only from a joint pattern of both

    likes and dislikes, asymmetrically ordered, that Wilk could identify social boundaries.

    Orthodox Contested Non-Contentious Stigmatised

    GT 15% like GT 15% like LT 15% like LT 15% like

    LT 25% dislike GT 25% dislike LT 25% dislike GT 25% dislike

    MANY LIKE MANY LIKE FEW LIKE FEW LIKE

    Few Dislike Many Dislike Few Dislike Many Dislike

    Turner Picasso Kahlo Modern literature

    Van Gogh World Cup Kind of Blue Bergman

    Lowry Who Dunnits Einstein on the Beach Modern jazz

    Four Seasons Classical Almodvar World

    Chicago Rock Campion Science FictionWonderwall Country and Western Rathnam Electronic

    Spielberg Oops Emin Heavy Metal

    Mahler 5th Grand National Religious

    Stan Romance

    Biography Warhol

    Hitchcock Urban

    General Election

    Self Help

    Queens Broadcast

    Figure 2. Controversy and legitimacy. Items classified by type and extent of controversyLegitimate items in bold.

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    23/28

    Warde 361

    Finally, therefore, I examine the proposition that dislikes are symbolically significant

    when they refer to items to which a potentially opposed group, not necessarily a class, is

    very attached. To do this items are sorted, after the fashion of Wilk (1997), in terms of

    their capacity to arouse controversy. I classify items in terms of the proportions of the

    population who like and dislike them (see Figure 2). Some items are liked by many anddisliked by few. I call these orthodox items, an example being the painting of Turner.

    Second, some items are liked by many people and also disliked by many. These I call

    contesteditems, ones which seem to induce both positive and negative sentiments in large

    degree. Examples include rock music, classical music, Picassos painting, and the Queens

    Christmas broadcast. Contested items have the greatest capacity to represent symbolic

    hostility between substantial sections of the population. Third, some items are liked by

    few people, and equally disliked by few, ones we might call non-contentious, examples

    being the paintings of Kahlo and Kind of Blue. Finally, there are items which few like and

    many dislike. These I callstigmatiseditems, and among them are modern literature, mod-ern jazz and religious literature. The classification of items can be seen in Figure 2.

    It might be expected that the items most germane to the cultural hostility thesis would

    belong to the contested and the stigmatized categories. These are ones where a substan-

    tial number of respondents have pronounced negatively upon an item, providing oppor-

    tunity to define social boundaries through cultural rejection. By contrast, since few

    dislike the orthodox or the non-contentious items, their capacity to arouse or mark social

    antagonism is limited.

    Figure 2 shows that few legitimate items, represented in bold type, are contested.

    Rock music and the art of Warhol are the only two of the 13 items dividing large sections

    Orthodox Contested Non-Contentious Stigmatised

    Turner Picasso Kahlo Modern literature

    Van Gogh World Cup Kind of Blue Bergman

    Lowry Who Dunnits Einstein on the Beach Modern jazz

    Four Seasons Classical Almodvar World

    Chicago Rock Campion Science FictionWonderwall Country and Western Rathnam Electronic

    Spielberg Oops Emin Heavy Metal

    Mahler 5th Grand National Religious books

    Stan Romances

    Biography Warhol

    Hitchcock Urban

    General Election

    Self Help

    Queens Broadcast

    Figure 3. Controversy and the unauthorised. Items classified by type and extent of controversyBold italics for unauthorised items

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    24/28

    362 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    of the population to be coded as legitimate. Neither was significant in understanding

    class differences. Two other legitimate items are widely disliked, examples of stigma-

    tized taste modern literature and heavy metal. The former did appear symbolically

    significant in relation to class, but the latter is coded as a preference of male graduates,

    apparently without class baggage. Generally, it is difficult to interpret the significance ofmost items, for each category except the non-contentious, has heterogeneous component

    elements. Ironically, greatest controversy over legitimate items occurs among the soci-

    etally non-contentious, a matter of internal, within-class dispute among those most com-

    mitted to high culture.

    Figure 3 offers further clarification about the symbolic significance of particular items

    and why they happen to be more or less controversial. The most controversial items,

    those in the contested category, are actually unauthorized ones; seven of the 11 items that

    are leastlegitimate divide the population most sharply. There is no simple interpretation,

    for the items are heterogeneous, but they probably reflect several different lines of socialcleavage. Controversy over whether to read romances or watch the world cup reflects

    gender differences. The three television programmes probably reflect generational dif-

    ferences. So probably does the liking for country and western, though we know that it is

    also coded by class. The stigmatized items which we hypothesized might arouse mutual

    hostility seem to capture a difference between those with religious interests and the

    rest, a division rarely considered in most studies of cultural taste.

    Thus, finally, we find some stronger evidence of cultural hostility, but mostly revolv-

    ing around non-legitimate items, and structured not by a single, but by multiple social

    cleavages. This gives some support to the general thesis of Wilk, who charted cross-cutting patterns of likes and dislikes which marked social divisions. However, given how

    difficult it has proved to track down the social significance of dislikes we might pause

    before agreeing that dislikes are a superior diagnostic tool upon which future research

    should concentrate. We might pause even longer before agreeing with Bourdieu that all

    determination is negative.

    Conclusions

    This paper has demonstrated that people have a wide range of dislikes. More dislikesthan likes are reported. Respondents proved more likely to register dislike of genres than

    of specific products. There were no strong overall patterns to dislikes. Nevertheless,

    some categories of person had more dislikes than others. People with degrees had the

    fewest dislikes, giving some support to the omnivorousness thesis. Those identifying as

    non-white also had fewer dislikes, perhaps suggesting commitment to multi-culturalism.

    Living in London also increases tolerance. But in general the patterns were statistically

    weak.

    Dislikes are associated with social divisions. Two sorts of class mechanism operate.

    The most powerful makes distinctions within classes. The instances are mostly within the

    professional-executive class where certain, usually rare and consecrated, items are sub-

    ject to contested evaluation. These may represent struggles for control of the cultural

    field among different fractions of the dominant class: they may even be minor evidence

    of the existence of an avant-garde fraction, interested in relatively arcane cultural

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    25/28

    Warde 363

    products and inclined to express dislike of legitimate but orthodox items, as with the

    paintings of Lowry and Turner. The second mechanism distinguishes the professional

    from the working class. A few items are significantly differently valued, the most telling

    ones, which might perhaps denote inter-class hostility, being watching the general elec-

    tion, classical music, Country and Western, serious literature, and the work of contro-versial artists. To the extent that these are objects of mutual and reciprocal antagonism,

    they are putative sources of hostility, of condescension and resentment. However, evi-

    dence for intense class hostility is sparse.

    While class matters, other divisions are probably equally important. Dislikes are dif-

    ferentially distributed by gender and generation as well as by class. However, symbolic

    items are still rather few and they are not the same for each social category. It therefore

    seems that dislikes are not as crucial, strategic and telling in Britain in 2003 as was

    thought by Bourdieu or Douglas. Dislikes, certainly if they are to play an important part

    in the process of social classification, should be strongly correlated to social position. Ingeneral, they are not. Moreover, the majority of distastes are not socially marked. Many

    cultural products are valued more or less equally by all, thus not a source of social dis-

    crimination. This is revealing, since it was initially anticipated that items included in the

    questionnaire would reveal social distinctions. If cultural hostility means one group dis-

    paraging another through their distaste for a broad set of cultural products, then it is not

    very prevalent in the UK. Dislikes are not, in themselves, evidence of intense or wide-

    spread hostility between social groups or categories. If Douglas was referring to general

    processes of social classification she appears to have exaggerated the role of socially

    structured dislikes.However, cultural hostility may yet be more complicated and more contextual.

    Potentially a small number of symbolically very significant items could provide a nexus

    of hostility. Controversial items were identified by considering simultaneously the juxta-

    position of likes and dislikes across various social boundaries. Modifying Wilks termi-

    nology, four groups of items were distinguished the orthodox, the contested, the

    non-contentious and the stigmatized. Some items are more likely sources of controversy

    than others and some engage much larger proportions of the population than others. The

    expectation that disagreement over legitimate items organizes boundaries, particularly

    boundaries of class, was not well supported. In Britain, legitimacy is not as significant asin Bourdieus France. Re-examination of legitimate and unauthorized items with refer-

    ence to the differential dislikes of the professional and the working classes, and men and

    women, identified some likely candidate items for expressing class and gender hostility,

    but these tend to revolve around unauthorized rather than legitimate items.

    To sum up, no doubt dislikes sometimes signify cultural hostility. Dislikes do parallel

    social divisions; class, gender and generational boundaries are marked in some instances.

    However, expressed dislikes are not such powerful indicators of meaningful social

    boundaries that they should be preferred over others as an analytic tool or practical guide

    for social classification. Dislikes do not obviously play the same pronounced role in

    Britain as in Belize. Even when considered in tandem with likes they are not highly sym-

    bolic markers of lines of social cleavage. The situation is more as described by Bryson

    for the USA, where a small, though not insignificant, role is played by aversions which

    belie universal tolerance of diversity of cultural taste. One reason that they are not

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    26/28

    364 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    currently strongly marked is probably because cultural omnivorousness, an openness to

    diversity, has become a principal principle of good taste (Fridman and Ollivier, 2004;

    Ollivier, 2008). Consequently, middle class expression of distaste for, or condescension

    towards, the aesthetic preferences of others is muted.

    Finally, the current evidence cannot dispel all suspicion that there exists a subterra-nean basis of deep cultural hostility. Perhaps the limited and heterogeneous items consid-

    ered above are inadequate to the task; future research might usefully consider a larger

    and wider range. Alternatively, it may be less judgments of taste focused on aesthetic

    products, like painting and film, than embodied characteristics, possessions or cultural

    practice that incite cultural hostility. Indeed, quantitative methods general may not be

    best fitted because context often matters greatly. Certainly qualitative evidence from the

    same study threw up a few instances of vehement rejection of symbolically-loaded prod-

    ucts, though such judgments rarely led to condemnation, implicit or explicit, of other

    social groups. Tastes differ, but with very little indication of condescension, and only alittle more of resentment. Moreover, few items are class or gender specific, as a compel-

    ling sociological account might require. Thus the survey results imply rejection of a

    strong cultural hostility thesis in respect of expressions of taste in contemporary Britain.

    Acknowledgements

    This paper draws on data produced by the research team for the ESRC project Cultural Capital and

    Social Exclusion: A Critical Investigation (Award no R000239801). The team comprised Tony

    Bennett (Principal Applicant), Mike Savage, Elizabeth Silva, Alan Warde (Co-Applicants), David

    Wright and Modesto Gayo-Cal (Research Fellows). The applicants were jointly responsible for thedesign of the national survey and the focus groups and household interviews that generated the

    quantitative and qualitative date for the project. Elizabeth Silva, assisted by David Wright, coordi-

    nated the analyses of the qualitative data from the focus groups and household interviews. Mike

    Savage and Alan Warde, assisted by Modesto Gayo-Cal, co-ordinated the analyses of the quantita-

    tive data produced by the survey. Tony Bennett was responsible for the overall coordination of the

    project. I am particularly indebted to Modesto Gayo-Cal for having prepared the principal compo-

    nent and regression analyses included in this paper. I am grateful also for comments on the paper

    from Modesto, Tony Bennett, Mike Savage, Elizabeth Silva and David Wright. They do not neces-

    sarily share the interpretations offered in this paper.

    Notes

    1. The focus groups, totalling 25, comprised between two and eight participants per group,

    involving a total of 143 participants, including 74 women and 69 men. The groups were

    conducted in six areas in the UK in 2003. Household interviews were conducted with 30

    respondents from the survey and 14 of their partners in 2005. Interviews were conducted with

    11 members of the British elite members of parliament, senior civil servants, landowners

    and corporate executives.

    2. Room 101 is the place to which, in a popular TV show, participants banish despised objects.

    3. The main survey was administered to a stratified, clustered sample from 111 postcode sectors

    and achieved a response rate of 52 % with a final sample of 1564 respondents aged 18 plus.

    Data was collected between November 2003 and March 2004 by the National Centre for

    Social Research. See Thomson (2004) for the technical report.

    4. The questionnaire aimed to include a range of items for each of several domains which earlier

    accounts had identified as definitive elements of high and popular culture, some mainstream

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    27/28

    Warde 365

    majority tastes and some specialised products associated with sub-cultures and the avant-garde.

    Choice of items drew on focus group discussions and the advice of a panel of a dozen sociolo-

    gists and arts professionals in order to obtain a coverage which was not biased towards particu-

    lar social groups or interest constituencies. Selection was guided by common sense, previous

    survey questions and earlier scholarly studies to compile a broad spread of cultural products andpractices which were symbolically significant and amenable to social interpretation.

    5. For NS-SeC classification, see Pevalin and Rose, 2003.

    6. The 40 items are necessarily highly selective and thus potentially open to criticism. (One

    referee viewed the array as too general, another thought some of them too obscure.) Since

    the survey was required to capture data relevant to many additional theoretical questions, the

    materials available may be sub-optimal for the current specific objective. Arguably, never-

    theless, they are fit for purpose, covering several different fields music, painting, cinema,

    television and literature and varying in their popularity and accessibility. Although some

    problems arise in interpretation of the statistical analysis because very few people like some

    of the items, it would be theoretically perverse to exclude rare items.7. For instance, the types of question were not identical; it is a moot point whether ranking

    heavy metal as 6 on a scale of 17 is an equivalent expression of dislike as saying that one

    would not make a point of watching the Queens Christmas broadcast.

    8. Because genres were much more readily disliked than were named items this might have

    somewhat reduced the reliability of constructing a scale which includes both. While certainly

    dislikes of genres much augmented scores on this scale, other exercises on products and gen-

    res separately provided even less interpretable solutions.

    9. This is a procedure or type of regression recommended for count data as a dependent vari-

    able, that is, integers with no negative values. This method implies using a Poisson distribu-

    tion and the log (natural logarithm) as the link function (Gujarati, 2003).10. That omnivorousness is not the explanation for the small number of aversions among the non-

    white ethnic category is suggested by the fact that they also reported many fewer likes.

    11. Further possibilities include that the dominant group likes legitimate items and is indifferent

    to all else, and that the subordinate groups likes very few legitimate or unauthorized items

    (univorousness). It is not possible that the subordinate group should like both legitimate and

    unauthorised items for then they would be indistinguishable from omnivores.

    12. So, 225 respondents reported liking science fiction books. 102 of the 366 with degrees (28 per

    cent) expressed a liking, as did 59 of the 419 without qualifications (14.2 per cent). I.e. of all

    who liked science fiction 28 % held degrees, while 14.2% had no qualifications, a ratio of 1.97.

    (It follows that 58 per cent of those liking science fiction had intermediate qualifications.)13. Although this procedure does not circumvent all objections, it escapes circularity (insofar as a

    respondents qualifications are not subsequently introduced to explain preferences for legiti-

    mate items) and also avoids simply using personal prejudices or out-of-date understandings

    about the prestige of cultural items.

    14. Recall that legitimacy is defined by likes.

    References

    Bourdieu, P. (1984 [1979) Distinction: A social critique of the judgment of taste. London:

    Routledge.

    Bourdieu, P. (1996 [1992]) The Rules of Art: genesis and structure of the literary field. Cambridge:

    Polity.

    Bryson, B. (1996) Anything but heavy metal: symbolic exclusion and musical dislikes,

    American Journal of Sociology, 102: 884899.

    Cultural Trends, (2006) Special edition, edited by T.Bennett and E.Silva, 15(23).

    at Flinders University on April 20, 2013cus.sagepub.comDownloaded from

    http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/http://cus.sagepub.com/
  • 7/27/2019 Cultural Sociology 2011 Warde 341 66

    28/28

    366 Cultural Sociology 5(3)

    Douglas, M. (1996) On not being seen dead: Shopping as protest, in Douglas, M., Thought Styles,

    pp. 77105. London: Sage.

    Fridman, V. and Ollivier M. (2004) Ouverture ostentatoire la diversit et cosmopolitisme: vers

    une nouvelle configuration discursive? Sociologie et Socits, 36: 105126.

    Gujarati, D. N. (2003): Basic Econometrics, New York: McGraw-Hill.Lamont, M. (2000) The Dignity of Working Men : Morality and the Boundaries of Race, Class, and

    Immigration. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.

    Le Roux, B., Rouanen, H., Savage, M. and Warde, A. (2008), The cultures of class: Britain 2003,

    Sociology, 42:104971.

    Ollivier, M. (2008) Models of openness to cultural diversity: Humanist, populist, practical and

    indifferent omnivores, Poetics, 36: 120147

    Peterson, R.A. (1992) Understanding Audience Segmentation: from elite and mass to omnivore

    and univore, Poetics, 21: 243258.

    Peterson, R.A. (2005) Problems in comparative research: The example of omnivorousness,

    Poetics, 33: 257282.Peterson, R. A. and Kern R. (1996) Changing Highbrow Taste: from Snob to Omnivore, American

    Sociological Review. 61: 900907.

    Rose, D. and Pevalin, D. (2003) A Researchers Guide to the National Statistics Socio-economic

    Classification, London: Sage.

    Thomson, K. (2004) Cultural capital and social exclusion survey: Technical Report. London:

    National Centre for Social Research.

    Warde, A. (2008) Does taste still serve power?, Sociologica: Italian Online Sociological Review,

    3: 126. http://www.sociologica.mulino.it/journal/article/index/Article/Journal:ARTICLE112

    Warde, A and Gayo-Cal M. (2009) The anatomy of cultural omnivorousness; the case of Britain,

    Poetics.Warde, A., Wright, D. and Gayo-Cal, M. (2007) Understanding cultural omnivorousness, or the

    myth of the cultural omnivore, Cultural Sociology, 1: 143164.

    Warde A., Wright D. and Gayo-Cal M. (2008) The omnivorousness orientation in the UK,

    Poetics, 36: 148165.

    Wilk, R. (1997) A critique of desire: distaste and dislike in consumer behaviour, Consumption,

    Markets & Culture, 1: 175196.

    Woodward, I. and Emmison, M. (2001) From aesthetic principles to collective sentiments: the

    logics of everyday judgements of taste, Poetics, 29: 295316.

    Alan Warde is Professor of Sociology in the School of Social Sciences at the University ofManchester. His research interests include the sociologies of consumption, culture and stratifica-

    tion. Recent publications include Culture, Class, Distinction (Routledge, 2009), written with Tony

    Bennett, Mike Savage, Elizabeth Silva, Modesto Gayo-Cal and David Wright, and Cultural

    Analysis and the Legacy of Bourdieu: settling accounts and developing alternatives, (Routledge,

    2010), co-edited with Elizabeth Silva.