[csaa-forum] Re: wanting to be effluent

[Brett Neilson]

>Yes francis - I see no necessary direct link at all - things are 
>Incidentally my comment re houses was about people in general be they in
>Liverpool,  Balmain,  Bankstown or wherever - after all  people are just 
>trying to make lives for themselves, and why shouldn't they? ( and I don't 
>believe they are all 'dupes' ( or dopes)).
>Jeannie
>BTW I have the latest Freedom catalogue if anyone wants a quick rundown

>---- Original Message -----
>From: "Francis Maravillas" <Francis.Maravillas at uts.edu.au>
>To: "CSAA discussion list" <csaa-forum at lists.cdu.edu.au>
>Sent: Tuesday, October 12, 2004 6:54 PM
>Subject: Re: [csaa-forum] RE: wanting to be effluent
>
>
>I agree, Jeannie. There seems to be a perception that people who have nice 
>a house can't be critical, progressive or 'leftish'. Class/cultural 
>capital distinctions do not necessarily correlate with political 
>positionalities (or voting behavior) - and even Bourdieu acknowledges that.
>
>Francis


Hey Jeannie,

I agree with Francis too and strongly so. But shouldn't this point be 
pushed a little more to say that class cannot be reduced to consumption, 
taste, or cultural capital. Not that anyone on the list has made that 
conflation but the discussion did drift immediately to consumption, an 
important topic but not the only one at stake.

If the category 'aspirational' has any analytical grip in the wake of the 
election (and I'm open to the suggestion that we have to invent new 
concepts) it is in the intersection between complex processes of social 
recomposition (based partly, as Melissa notes, in the changing relations 
between work and non-work) and an ossified geography of political 
representation. Where are the marginal seats? That is a key question in 
analysing the election. And, at that point, there is a need to reintroduce 
an argument about the spatial order of the city (recognising the passage of 
that order beyond simple centre/periphery distinctions). Not to isolate the 
processes of class recomposition to certain areas but to understand how 
they intersect the zero-sum game of representative democracy.

I am impressed by what Amanda says about the need for a politics of 
empathy/affect within and between changing class relations/conflicts. For 
me the starting point for this would have to be the distrust of politicians 
and the disengagement with representative democratic processes (watching 
Idol instead of the debate, etc.). Perhaps there is room for opening and 
dialogue with those of us trying to understand how democratic processes 
might operate beyond (or even underneath) representation. But this will 
have to involve multiple engagements, through ethnic communities perhaps or 
everyday practices on particular sites.

Often this may be prepolitical but it can also involve a different kind of 
politics, a politics of relation. Either way it is important to understand 
how the political emerges. And how it functions in a complex media 
environment with a multiplication of channels and possibilities for 
connection. But here I feel we are reaching the limits of cultural analysis.

Brett