Socio-Economic Inequality and Its Representations: Context and Pretext
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Authors
Fantasia, Rick
Issue Date
2014-11-14
Type
event
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Language
Keywords
Inequality and Stratification
Politics and Social Change
Alternative Title
The Liberal Arts in an Unequal Society
Abstract
Socio-economic inequality in the United States is both severe and rising, driven by near unrestrained corporate behavior in the marketplace, the workplace, and the political domain. While this dynamic has been most evident at a material level, amply demonstrated statistically and descriptively, at the symbolic level socio-economic polarization is much less apparent. The effect of this disjuncture is to obscure, if not mystify, the full character of socio-economic reality in the United States. This presentation will focus on the interpenetration of the material and symbolic aspects of socio-economic inequality by viewing the forms that exist “out there” (in social practices and institutions) and forms that are inscribed “in here” (in our heads and in our collective imagination). Among other things, by putting a lens on the reciprocally-confirming relationship between social life and its representations, we confront important and necessary questions about the role and the place of the Liberal Arts (both as institution and as intellectual stance) in the society, thereby prompting critical reflection on our own relationship to the social order and to social change.