Moral Identity and Competition in a Working Class Neighborhood

An enduring finding in consumption communities and socio logical research is that consumers socially stratify themselves (Veblen 1994/1899). Bourdieu (1977, 1984) theorizes society as made up of overlapping social fields where people compete for social distinction by employing economic, cultural, and social resources. In particular, the cultural capital of the working classes is conceptualized as subordinate to the cultural capital of higher classes. The working classes lack resources so they create a culture of necessity where they develop a taste for the practical, passively accept popular culture, and are united in their conformity. Recent empirical work using survey data similarly portrays working class culture as deficit where poor consumers have little education, do not read books or attend cultural events, and have few preferences beyond consuming commercialized popular culture and visiting fast food restaurants (Bennett et al. 2009). Consumer researchers have extended this work on status consumption, challenging some of the initial assumptions and stressing the importance of consumption practices (Holt 1998; Ustuner and Holt 2007, 2010).