A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
The significance of Pierre Bourdieu’s work for architectural theory is partly owing to his account of capital. For Bourdieu, capital is not limited to economic resources, but it also includes specific cultural assets. This cultural capital is in turn represented by signs, such as the symbolic values that are associated with a prestigious house or prime office space. Bourdieu used the term ‘symbolic capital’ to account for these signs. He also recognised that while cultural assets follow from the possession of economic capital, the signs or symbolic capital through which those assets are represented in the world facilitate the acquisition of further economic and social gains. Thus, the signs and socio-aesthetic equations of architecture can underpin the further acquisition of economic, cultural, and social rewards. In this article, I examine the signs embodied in prime office space in relation to Bourdieu’s understanding of symbolic capital. I focus on the ways in which it functions with respect to flows of economic to symbolic (cultural) to economic capital. I show that these symbolic values and the cultural capital that they represent yield particular rewards and help maintain the system of socioeconomic relations that generates these rewards.
The significance of Pierre Bourdieu’s work for architectural theory is partly owing to his account of capital. For Bourdieu, capital is not limited to economic resources, but it also includes specific cultural assets. This cultural capital is in turn represented by signs, such as the symbolic values that are associated with a prestigious house or prime office space. Bourdieu used the term ‘symbolic capital’ to account for these signs. He also recognised that while cultural assets follow from the possession of economic capital, the signs or symbolic capital through which those assets are represented in the world facilitate the acquisition of further economic and social gains. Thus, the signs and socio-aesthetic equations of architecture can underpin the further acquisition of economic, cultural, and social rewards. In this article, I examine the signs embodied in prime office space in relation to Bourdieu’s understanding of symbolic capital. I focus on the ways in which it functions with respect to flows of economic to symbolic (cultural) to economic capital. I show that these symbolic values and the cultural capital that they represent yield particular rewards and help maintain the system of socioeconomic relations that generates these rewards.
Bourdieu in London
Malone, Patrick (author)
The Journal of Architecture ; 25 ; 679-696
2020-08-17
18 pages
Article (Journal)
Electronic Resource
Unknown
| TIBKAT | 2011
| British Library Online Contents | 2004