Page 81 - Cultural Change and Ordinary Life

72 Cultural change and ordinary life

dynamics of class in what I have called ordinary life. Fourth, I follow this with
consideration of evaluation and responses to the idea and reality of class.
Sayer certainly does not divorce the consideration of cultural aspects of
class from structural forces. Indeed he is at pains to link cultural and economic
processes. However, I emphasize the way in which he points to the significance
of daily and lived experience to the consideration of class. He seeks to explore
the moral (which he uses interchangeably with ethical) significance of class, in
the area that he calls ‘lay normativity’ (2005: 2). He sees therefore that ordin-
ary life is infused with and cross-cut by moral and ethical concerns, feelings
and rationalities. A significant part of his critique of other theories of class
(including the cultural work of Bourdieu) revolves around the way in which
they neglect morality and associated issues. This is a version of ordinary life
that is characterized as consisting of struggles and competition, but as well
where peoples ‘strive to flourish’ (p. 68). This is all significant to the version of
ordinary life here and the approach of Sayer adds some important dimensions
to the argument. Furthermore, he also adds some important riders to Bourdieu’s
concept of the habitus.
Sayer’s examination of the idea of the habitus depends on his view of
‘the need to develop an understanding of the normative orientation of the
habitus, especially its ethical dispositions’ (p. 23). Sayer deploys a number of
arguments in seven stages to get to his revision of habitus. The outcome of this
process is a version of the idea that emphasizes three key aspects: the inter-
action of what can be seen as ingrained ‘dispositions’ and the conscious will to
act in diverse ways; the way in which people have space to exercise ‘agency’
and ordinary reflection on their actions, which enables them to change – what
Sayer calls ‘mundane reflexivity’ (2005: 51); and that people display ‘norma-
tive orientations, emotions and commitments’ (p. 51). Commitments in this
formulation are to a range of different aspects of social and cultural life, in
ways that recall the work of Karl Mannheim (see Longhurst 1989) on the way
in which Marxists characterized the notion of interest in too narrow and econ-
omistic a fashion. Thus, Sayer moves even wider than the version of economic,
cultural and social versions of interest in Bourdieu. In this context it is
important to note that ‘people do not strive for resources and recognition,
they strive to flourish by living in ways they have reason to value and this
depends on more than either resources or recognition’ (p. 68).
Sayer develops this approach to consider how people evaluate others in
the course of what I have called ordinary life. In general, he identifies three
different realms in which such evaluation operates. The first is ‘aesthetic:
regarding matters such as décor, clothing and personal appearance’. The sec-
ond is ‘performative: regarding competence and performance, such as that of a
doctor or teacher’. The third is ‘moral: regarding moral qualities or propriety’
(p. 142). Sayer focuses on the moral dimension (although he notes that the
three dimensions can overlap). He identifies a number of forms of moral ‘sen-
timents’. These include ‘sympathy or fellow feeling’, ‘benevolence and gener-
osity’, ‘compassion and pity’, ‘envy and resentment’, ‘justice’, ‘toleration’,
‘shame’ and ‘humiliation’. In this discussion, Sayer is careful not simply to
emphasize how the exercise of these sentiments can show how human beings
have positive feelings for others, but to recognize the downside of class-based