This article explores the nexus of class, gender, and musical taste for the white middle-class family in the USA from the late 1940s through the mid-1950s. Cultural intermediaries in the western concert music field embraced an upper-middlebrow aesthetic and, in the anomic age of the reconversion era, buttressed the symbolic boundaries of whiteness for their middle-class readership. Using Bourdieu's work on fields and taste, I examine the representation of the classificatory schemes of western concert music in George Marek's music column in Good Housekeeping , one of the era's most popular magazines. I also examine how musical practices were gendered in the familial embodiment of cultural capital.This study concludes with an elaboration of Bourdieu's work on fields and Negus's work on cultural intermediaries, in order to highlight the connections between the privileges of musical taste and racialization in the USA, at mid-century and today.
Affelder, P. (1947) How to Build a Record Library. New York: E.P. Dutton.
2.
Alfred Politz Research (1955) The Audiences of Nine Magazines:Their Size and Characteristics. New York: Cowles Magazines.
3.
Avila, E. (2004) Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight: Fear and Fantasy in Suburban Los Angeles. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
4.
Bartlett, K. (1947) `Social Impact of the Radio', Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science250 (March): 89-97.
5.
Bettie, J. (2000) `Women without Class: Chicas, Cholas,Trash and the Presence/Absence of Class Identity', Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society26(1): 1-35.
6.
Binkley, S. (2003) `The Seers of Menlo Park', Journal of Consumer Culture3(3): 283-313.
7.
Binkley, S. (2007) Getting Loose: Lifestyle Consumption in the 1970s . Durham, NC: Duke University Press .
8.
Bourdieu, P. (1984) Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste, trans. R. Nice. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
9.
Bourdieu, P. (1990) The Logic of Practice, trans. R. Nice. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
10.
Bourdieu, P. (1993a) Sociology in Question.Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
11.
Bourdieu, P. (1993b) The Field of Cultural Production: Essays on Art and Literature, ed. L. Kritzman and R. Johnson.New York: Columbia University Press.
12.
Bourdieu, P. (2001) Masculine Domination. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
13.
Bryson, B. (1996) `"Anything but Heavy Metal": Symbolic Exclusion and Musical Dislikes', American Sociological Review61: 884-99.
14.
Crawford, R. (2001) America's Musical Life: A History. New York: W. W. Norton. Darrell, R. (1953a) Good Listening. New York: Knopf .
15.
DeNora,T. (1991) `Musical Patronage and Social Change in Beethoven's Vienna', American Journal of Sociology97(2): 310-46.
16.
DeNora,T. (1995) Beethoven and the Construction of Genius: Musical Politics in Vienna, 1792-1803. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
17.
DeNora,T. (2004) `Historical Perspectives in Music Sociology', Poetics32: 211-21.
18.
DiMaggio, P. (1979) `On Pierre Bourdieu : Review Essay', American Journal of Sociology84(6): 1460-74.
19.
DiMaggio, P. (1982) `Cultural Entrepreneurship in Nineteenth-century Boston', Media, Culture and Society4: 33-55, 303-322.
20.
DiMaggio, P. (1987) `Classification in Art', American Sociological Review52(4): 440-55.
21.
DiMaggio, P. (1991) `Social Structure, Institutions, and Cultural Goods' , in P. Bourdieu and J.S. Coleman (eds) Social Theory for a Changing World, pp. 133-55. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
22.
Douglas, S. (1995) Where the Girls Are: Growing up Female with the Mass Media. New York:Times Books .
23.
Douglas, S. (1999) Listening In: Radio and the American imagination. New York: Times Books .
24.
Dowd,T. ( 2003) `Structural Power and the Construction of Markets:The Case of Rhythm and Blues', Comparative Social Research21: 147-201.
25.
Dowd,T., Liddle, K.Lupo, K. and Borden, A. (2002) `Organizing the Musical Canon: The Repertoires of Major US Symphony Orchestras, 1842 to 1969', Poetics30: 35-61.
26.
Drowne, K., and Huber, P. (2004) The 1920s. Westport, CT: Greenwood.
27.
Fairclough, N. (1989) Language and Power. New York : Longman.
28.
Fowler, B. (2003) `Reading Pierre Bourdieu's Masculine Domination: Notes towards an Intersectional Analysis of Gender, Culture and Class', Cultural studies17(3/4): 468-94.
29.
Friedan, B. (1963) The Feminine Mystique. New York : W.W. Norton.
30.
Gabler, J. and J. Kaufman (2006) `Chess, Cheerleading, Chopin: What Gets you into College?', Contexts5(2): 45-9.
31.
Garnham, N. (2000) Emancipation, the Media, and Modernity. New York: Oxford.
32.
Goldfield, E. (1956) Statistical Abstracts of the United States: 77th Annual Edition. Washington, DC: US Department of Commerce.
33.
Hall, S. (1996) `What is this "Black" in Black Popular Culture?' , In David Morley and Kuan-Hsing Chen (eds) Stuart Hall: Critical Dialogues in Cultural Studies, pp. 465-75. New York: Routledge.
34.
Hallstrom, J. (1947) Relax and Listen: How to Enjoy Music through Records . New York: Rinehart.
35.
Harvey, D. (1990) The Condition of Postmodernity. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell.
36.
Hepokoski, J. and Darcy, W. (2006) Elements of Sonata Theory: Norms,Types, and Deformations in the Late-eighteenth-century Sonata. New York: Oxford.
37.
Holt, D. (1997) `Distinction in America? Recovering Bourdieu's Theory of Tastes from its Critics', Poetics25(2/3): 93-120.
38.
Honey, M. (1984) Creating Rosie the Riveter: Class, Gender, and Propaganda during World War II. Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press.
39.
Howe, S. (2003) `The NBC Music Appreciation Hour: Radio Broadcasts of Walter Damrosch, 1928-1942', Journal of Research in Music Education51(4): 64-77.
40.
Katz, M. (2004) Capturing Sound: How Technology has Changed Music . Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
41.
Kozol,W. (1994) Life's America. Philadelphia , PA:Temple University Press.
42.
Lareau, A. (2003) Unequal Childhoods. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
43.
Lebergott, S. (1993) Pursuing Happiness. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
44.
Leppert, R. (1999) `Cultural Contradiction, Idolatry, and the Piano Virtuoso: Franz Liszt', in J. Parakilas (ed.) Piano Roles:Three Hundred Years of Life with the Piano, pp. 252-81. New Haven, CT:Yale University Press.
45.
Levine, L. (1988) Highbrow/Lowbrow:The Emergence of Cultural Hierarchy in America. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
46.
Life (1949) `High-brow, Lower-brow, Middle-brow', Life, 11 April, pp. 99-101.
47.
Lipsitz, G. (1995) `The possessive investment in whiteness'. American quarterly47(3): 369-387.
48.
Lipsitz, G. (2006) The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit from Identity Politics. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
49.
Lopes, P. (2000) `Pierre Bourdieu's Fields of Cultural Production' , in N. Brown and I. Szeman (eds) Pierre Bourdieu: Fieldwork in Culture, pp. 165-85.Totowa, NJ: Rowman and Littlefield.
50.
Lopes, P. (2002) The Rise of a Jazz Art World. New York: Cambridge University Press.
51.
Lynes, R. (1949) `Highbrow, Lowbrow, Middlebrow', Harper's, February, pp. 73-96.
52.
Marek, G. (1945) `The Great Man of Music . . . and Records for Christmas' , Good Housekeeping, December, pp. 4, 140.
53.
Marek, G. (1946a) `How to Help your Child Practice', Good Housekeeping, March, pp. 4, 224.
54.
Marek, G. (1946b) `Music Quiz', Good Housekeeping , October, p. 4.
55.
Marek, G. (1947a) `Keep Young with Music', Good Housekeeping, March, pp. 4, 274-5.
56.
Marek, G. (1947b) `You - and the Concert Season', Good Housekeeping, September, pp. 4, 200-1.
57.
Marek, G. (1947c) `Music in the Home', Good Housekeeping , October, pp. 4, 174-5.
58.
Marek, G. (1948a) A Front Seat at the Opera. New York: Allen,Towne & Heath.
59.
Marek, G. (1948b) `The World Owed Him a Living', Good Housekeeping, February. pp. 4, 132-4.
60.
Marek, G. (1948c) `The Most Popular Piano Concerto', Good Housekeeping . April. p. 4, 312.
61.
Marek, G. (1949a) `Beethoven on Sunday Afternoons', Good Housekeeping, March, pp. 4, 231-2.
62.
Marek, G. (1949b) `Genius with a Hat On', Good Housekeeping , November, pp. 4, 133-4.
63.
Marek, G. (1949c) The Good Housekeeping Guide to Musical Enjoyment . New York: Rinehart.
64.
Marek, G. (1954a) `What does Wagner Mean to us Today?', Good Housekeeping, October. p. 102.
65.
Marek, G. (1954b) `Today's Young Artists Don't Wake Us Up', Good Housekeeping, April, pp. 141-2.
66.
Marek, G. (1956) `It Isn't All Junk: Rock'n'Roll', Good Housekeeping, October, pp. 228-31.
67.
May, E. (1996) `Rosie the Riveter Gets Married', In L. Erenberg and S. Hirsch (eds) The War in American Culture: Society and Consciousness during World War II, pp. 128-43. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
68.
McCall, L. (1992) `Does Gender Fit? Bourdieu, Feminism, and Conceptions of Social Order', Theory and Society21(6): 837-67.
69.
McClary, S. (1991) Feminine Endings: Music, Gender, and Sexuality . Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.
70.
McCullough, D. (1992) Truman. New York: Simon & Schuster.
71.
Moraga, C. and AnzaldĂșa, G. (eds) (1983) This Bridge called my Back:Writings by Radical Women of Color. New York: Kitchen Table.
72.
Negus, K. (2002) `The Work of Cultural Intermediaries and the Enduring Distance between Production and Consumption', Cultural Studies16(4):501-15.
73.
Nixon, S. and du Gay, P. (2002) `Who Needs Cultural Intermediaries?', Cultural Studies16(4): 495-500.
74.
Peterson, R., and R. Kern (1996) `Changing Highbrow Taste: From Snob to Omnivore' , American Sociological Review61: 900-7.
75.
Potter, P. (1955) `What Happened to All the Good Songs?', Good Housekeeping, May, p. 20.
76.
Radway, J. (1997) A Feeling for Books:The Book-of-the-month Club, Literary Taste, and Middle-class Desire. Chapel Hill, NC : University of North Carolina Press.
77.
Sherwin, A. and Y.Yeebo. (2007) `How Much is Radiohead's Online Album Worth? Nothing at All, Say a Third of Fans', Times Online , 11 October. URL (accessed 5 September 2008) http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/article2633798.ece
78.
Spock, B. (1946) The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care. New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce.
79.
Swartz, D. (1997) Culture & Power:The Sociology of Pierre Bourdieu . Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
80.
Thomas, D. (2005) Editorial review, Amazon.com . URL (accessed 25 October 2005) http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00000INEW/002-7518049-5617646?v=glance
81.
Time (1955) `Mail-Order Maelstrom' , Time, 29 August, p. 68.
82.
Turner, S. and Bound, J. (2002) `Closing the Gap or Widening the Divide:The Effects of the GI Bill and World War II on the Educational Outcomes of Black Americans' ,Working Paper 9044. URL (accessed 27 December 2008) http://www.nber.org/papers/w9044
83.
Waller, M. (1949) `The Compleat Listener', New York Times, 23 October, p. 42.
84.
Ward, G. and K. Burns. (2000) Jazz: A History of America's Music . New York: Knopf. Excerpted at URL (accessed 16 May 2008) http://www.pbs.org/jazz/time/time_depression.htm
85.
Weber,W. (2004) Music and the Middle Class. New York: Ashgate.
86.
Woloch, N. (1984). Women and the American Experience. New York: Knopf.
87.
Young, Jr, A. (1999) `The (Non) Accumulation of Capital: Explicating the Relationship of Structure and Agency in the Lives of Poor Black Men', Sociological theory17(2): 201-27.
