Cultural hierarchies they are a-changin’: music in quality newspapers’ culture sections

Semi Purhonen

Chapter 8 in Research Handbook on the Sociology of Consumption, 2026, pp 106-115 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: Due to the scarcity of long-term, high-quality datasets such as surveys and interviews, scholars of cultural consumption have increasingly turned to cultural mediation and production to study changes in cultural hierarchies over time. Media data, especially from newspapers, provide insights into temporal trends and enable comparative analyses across national contexts. This chapter summarizes findings from a large-scale comparative research project that examined cultural hierarchy shifts in culture sections of leading newspapers in Finland, France, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, and the UK. It focuses on articles about classical and popular music published between 1960 and 2010. The research revealed a decline in classical music coverage and an expansion of popular music articles. The rise of pop-rock music coincided with the legitimization of popular music as ‘real’ art in newspapers’ evaluative discourse, reflecting two intertwined processes: the legitimization of popular culture and the popularization of highbrow arts.

Keywords: Cultural hierarchies; Cultural intermediaries; Legitimization; Music; Newspapers; Popularization (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781035310500
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