4
This article was downloaded by: [Statsbiblioteket Tidsskriftafdeling] On: 23 April 2014, At: 04:07 Publisher: Routledge Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK Social History Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rshi20 The Making of the Middle Class: Toward a Transnational History Ezequiel Adamovsky a a University of Buenos Aires/CONICET Published online: 12 Aug 2013. To cite this article: Ezequiel Adamovsky (2013) The Making of the Middle Class: Toward a Transnational History, Social History, 38:3, 409-411, DOI: 10.1080/03071022.2013.807637 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03071022.2013.807637 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the “Content”) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis, our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content. Any opinions and views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors, and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of the Content. This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms- and-conditions

The Making of the Middle Class: Toward a Transnational History

Embed Size (px)

Citation preview

Page 1: The Making of the Middle Class: Toward a Transnational History

This article was downloaded by: [Statsbiblioteket Tidsskriftafdeling]On: 23 April 2014, At: 04:07Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registeredoffice: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK

Social HistoryPublication details, including instructions for authors andsubscription information:http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rshi20

The Making of the Middle Class: Towarda Transnational HistoryEzequiel Adamovsky aa University of Buenos Aires/CONICETPublished online: 12 Aug 2013.

To cite this article: Ezequiel Adamovsky (2013) The Making of the Middle Class: Toward aTransnational History, Social History, 38:3, 409-411, DOI: 10.1080/03071022.2013.807637

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03071022.2013.807637

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE

Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the“Content”) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis,our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as tothe accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content. Any opinionsand views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors,and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Contentshould not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sourcesof information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims,proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoeveror howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to orarising out of the use of the Content.

This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Anysubstantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing,systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. Terms &Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and-conditions

Page 2: The Making of the Middle Class: Toward a Transnational History

The weaknesses are few, and certainly not worth dwelling upon. Garon has providedan account that shows, as with the study of consumption, the limitations of economicunderstandings of this routine aspect of human behaviour. It is doubtful that there willnow be a scholarly turn to savings on a level equal to the outpouring of work onconsumer society that has occurred over the last thirty years. But should there be so, thenBeyond Our Means would be an excellent place to start.

Matthew HiltonUniversity of Birminghamq 2013, Matthew Hilton

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03071022.2013.807623

A. Ricardo Lopez and Barbara Weinstein (eds), The Making of the Middle Class:Toward a Transnational History (2012), xi þ446 (Duke University Press, Durham andLondon, $99.95, paperback $27.95).

A. Ricardo Lopez and Barbara Weinstein have put together an ambitious volume thatsets out to ‘rethink the historical formation of the middle class across the world’ (12) as atransnational process. The middle class is therefore understood as ‘an idea and as a practiceof modernity’ that needs to be reconsidered, by moving beyond the usual narrativesmodelled on the trajectory of the North Atlantic societies. ‘Middle-class modernities’, theeditors argue, ‘were not originally European, uniquely North American, homogeneouslyAnglo, alternatively Indian, genuinely African, or differently Latin American, but rathertransnational historical formations through which the meanings, subjectivities, andpractices of being middle class were mutually – and coevally – constituted across theglobe’ (12). With this aim in mind, the book compiles sixteen case studies that examinedifferent aspects of the middle class – from explanations of its emergence and mainfeatures, to ethnographical accounts of distinctive practices – in thirteen locations: India,Zimbabwe, England, the United States, Canada, Colombia, Mexico, Peru, Chile, theMiddle East, Germany, France and Argentina. All the contributions come from paperspresented at the symposium ‘We Shall Be All: Toward a Global History of the MiddleClass’, held in Maryland in 2006.

The introduction, by Lopez (with Weinstein) begins by showing the extent to which‘middle class’ continues to be a subject of political discussions. Indeed – as the muchdebated issue of the rise of a ‘global middle class’ illustrates – this topic is often related toanxieties with regard to the future of western society. This political common wisdom isthen associated to the traditional historiography, best exemplified by Jurgen Kocka’sworks, which identified an objective social layer, a democratic, modern, progressive (andNorth Atlantic) middle class, which in turn was considered the main engine ofmodernity. In this view, the understanding of the middle class in places other than itssupposed ‘cradle’ is reduced to stories of failure or partial/frustrated emulation. Althoughseveral scholars have shown its shortcomings, this historiography has proven remarkably

August 2013 Reviews 409

Dow

nloa

ded

by [

Stat

sbib

liote

ket T

idss

krif

tafd

elin

g] a

t 04:

07 2

3 A

pril

2014

Page 3: The Making of the Middle Class: Toward a Transnational History

resilient, which justifies the need of a new, non-Eurocentric approach. In addition, theauthors argue that, in trying to overcome the shortcomings of the view a la Kocka, somerecent contributions ended up considering the middle class a mere abstraction, ametaphor, a rhetorical device; if anything, little more than an identity. Against thisstance, the introduction makes the case for a middle ground, one that acknowledges the‘formative power of language or discourse, while interrogating the different historicalmaterial practices of middle-class subjectivity’ (20).

However insightful, the review of the literature in the introduction seems quitelimited. All of the works referred to are in English, something odd for a book that seeks topromote a transnational dialogue. The only exception is one author published in Spanish(incidentally, myself), but the standpoint of my work is seriously misrepresented (themethodology of the Begriffsgeschichte is surprisingly mistaken for a ‘textual’ approach,something quite alien to my theoretical framework). Particularly missed here are theearlier international efforts led by Pierre Guillaume, which provided crucial conceptualreflection and evidence for the very same issues at stake in this volume, and thecomparative analysis by Geoffrey Crossick, who made the case for a similar middleground in the ‘invention v. formation’ debate, to mention but two of the rich andnumerous contributions available in French. On the other hand, the introduction’semphasis on the relationship between middle class and modernity is illuminating. There isno doubt that that is one of the keys for a transnational comprehension of the matter. Therest of the book examines that hypothesis thoroughly, making of it, arguably, the mostimportant contribution of the volume. One is left with the impression, however, that theauthors conceive that relationship as intrinsic to the very idea of ‘middle class’, somethingthat would be misleading. Indeed, the introduction would have benefited from aconsideration of the ancient uses of that idea, an issue that passes unmentioned. In fact,much of its current content – the notion of the ‘golden mean’ between extremes and thesense of moral and political superiority associated with it – is not particularly ‘modern’but comes from Aristotle’s times.

The collection of articles is inspiring. The pieces by Sanjay Joshi, Daniel Walkowitz,A. Ricardo Lopez, Inigo Garcıa Bryce, Susanne Eineigel, Carol Harrison, David Parkerand Enrique Garguin are particularly worthy of attention, as they produce innovativeapproaches and/or engage in a wider discussion with the main concerns of the book.Some of the other articles, however, seem to have little or no relation to the aims of thevolume as a whole. Nevertheless, any weakness that an individual contribution maydisplay is more than counter-balanced by the four brilliant commentaries by BarbaraWeinstein, Mary Kay Vaughan, Brian Owensby and RobynMuncy, and the stimulatingafterword by Mrinalini Sinha, which draw commonalities between cases, explaindifferences, point out contradictions, cast light on the shared experience of modernity,illuminate the gendered and racial dimensions to middle-classness, identify areas in needof further research, and relate diverse matters to the main historiographical debates.

The lack of discussion of the problem of the inter-temporal, inter-societal and inter-linguistic translatability of the ‘middle-class’ concept is perhaps a flaw in this collectiveeffort. In other words, that concept not only has shifting boundaries, but it may also referto totally different historical phenomena. Under the label ‘middle class’, some of the

410 Social History VOL. 38 : NO. 3

Dow

nloa

ded

by [

Stat

sbib

liote

ket T

idss

krif

tafd

elin

g] a

t 04:

07 2

3 A

pril

2014

Page 4: The Making of the Middle Class: Toward a Transnational History

pieces in this volume examine issues related to the historical experience of the middlinggroups that are located between the lower layer of society and the bourgeoisie. But forother articles, ‘middle class’ is synonymous with ‘bourgeoisie’ or even ‘elite’. And this isnot just a matter of terminology. Michael West’s piece on Zimbabwe deals with themaking of a national elite in a colonial context. David Parker analyses the life of clerks,officers, liberal professionals lacking fortune and prosperous artisans in Chile and Peru.The fact that both of them chose the label ‘middle class’ to define their object of studydoes not mean that they are talking of a comparable historical experience. If one wants tocompare, Parker’s little men would be closer to the lives of those left behind by West’srising elite, squeezed – so to speak – between the higher and the lower layers and with noprospect of becoming a ruling class. As noted by Guillaume and suggested by RobynMuncy in this volume, if the translatability problem is not dealt with, any comparativeeffort is destined to be unreliable (unless the ‘middle class’ is considered a purely rhetoricaldevice, something that the editors of this volume reject). This critique notwithstanding,the volume undoubtedly represents a step forward in the development of a field ofmiddle-class studies. The insights of the introduction, the intelligence of thecommentaries and afterword, and the variety of methods at play and of issues dealtwith in each individual article will surely make of this book a fundamental read forscholars to come.

Ezequiel AdamovskyUniversity of Buenos Aires/CONICET

q 2013, Ezequiel Adamovskyhttp://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03071022.2013.807637

Scott Spector, Helmut Puff and Dagmar Herzog (eds), After The History ofSexuality: German Genealogies With and Beyond Foucault (2012), 310 (BerghahnBooks, New York and Oxford, $95.00/£60.00, paperback, $29.95/£18.75).

The original French edition of Michel Foucault’s The History of Sexuality: An Introduction(New York, 1978) was published in 1976. This rather slim volume, which Foucaultmerely intended to be an introduction to a series of historical studies and which historianshave criticized for its lack of a solid empirical basis, has managed to dominate research anddiscussions on the history of sexuality to this very day. Foucault’s provocative thesis iswell known: sexuality is not some natural essence that can be either repressed or liberated,but a modern, western social construction. As such, it is entrapped in the discipliningeffects of an inexhaustible will to know and discuss the desires of the flesh.

This new collection of seventeen articles about the history of sexuality in Germanycovers a wide period – from the Middle Ages to the present – and takes Foucault’sperspective as a source of inspiration, but at the same time the authors question, refine andgo beyond it. Their contributions turn away from many of the more one-dimensionalhistorical studies of sexuality appearing in the 1980s and 1990s, which tended to follow his

August 2013 Reviews 411

Dow

nloa

ded

by [

Stat

sbib

liote

ket T

idss

krif

tafd

elin

g] a

t 04:

07 2

3 A

pril

2014