Miscellanea

"Irony chic, it seems, is suddenly terribly fashionable. But what is important about this is that the celebration of trash is not a political act of ‘identification with the poor’ but rather an exhibition of middle-class knowingness. Those investing in alternative and ironic forms of cultural capital- such as Paul Smith’s ‘witty’ shirts and satirical fabrics- are what Bourdieu terms the ‘new style autodidacts’ (cited in Sconce 1995: 376); people who can transgress conventional taste boundaries and invest in unsanctioned culture because they have already acquired the requisite cultural- and economic- capital. The important point, of course, is that in reality some people have access to both high and low culture, but the majority only have access to low. In other words, those who have access is essentially a class privilege (Sconce 1995: 383). In this way, a taste for kitsch, irony and bad taste may ultimately be an act of unintended, middle-class condescension."

- Louise Crewe and Alison Goodrum, “Fashioning New Forms of Consumption: The case of Paul Smith” (via organization)