Article,
Neither Class nor Status: Arts Participation and the Social Strata
Sociology, 49 (4): 624-642 (2015)
DOI: 10.1177/0038038514547897
Abstract
What is the relationship between social stratification and arts participation? Because the barriers to both participation and consumption vary, the relationship between the social strata and arts participation may differ from the relationship between social strata and arts consumption. Using three pooled waves of the Taking-Part survey (N = 78,011), I estimate latent class and multinomial logistic models to examine the association between education, social status, social class, and income with patterns of arts participation. Five latent clusters are observed and both social status and social class are insignificantly associated with each cluster. In contrast, education remains strongly correlated with most forms of arts participation. These results indicate that arts participation, as a constituent part of ‘lifestyle’, is not primarily explained through social status or social class but rather through education.
