Teaching & Learning Guide for: Class Identification in Review: Past Perspectives and Future Directions

• Published in: Sociology compass 2012-01, Vol.6 (1), p.97-101
• Main Authors: Archer, Patrick, Orr, Ryan
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Class Identity; Durkheim, Emile; History of Sociology; Inequality; Learning; Marx, Karl; Teaching; Veblen, Thorstein Bunde; Weber, Max
• ISSN: 1751-9020; 1751-9020
• DOI: 10.1111/j.1751-9020.2011.00431.x

This guide accompanies the following article: Patrick Archer and Ryan Orr, ‘Class Identification in Review: Past Perspectives and Future Directions’, Sociology Compass 5/1 (2011): 104–115, 10.1111/j.1751‐9020.2010.00352.x Author’s introduction Historically, sociology has had a contentious relationship with the concept of class. At times, debates over the meaning and importance of class have defined the field. More recently, however, the notable absence or weakness of class identities in class‐oriented research has led many sociologists to abandon class as an organizing concept in society. The response of class loyalists to this class‐less re‐theorization of stratification and inequality has developed along two paths. The first path emphasizes the continued importance of class as an influential force in people’s lives, but jettisons any assumptions of subjective class identification. The second path has repackaged class as being hierarchical and relational while downplaying the existence of collective class identification. One consequence of these new developments in class theory has been a movement away from classical class theory and the assumed centrality of collective class identification in this work. The purpose of this article is to reexamine the contributions of classical class theory – particularly that of Marx, Weber, Durkheim, and Veblen – to the debate on collective class identification. Two questions guided this analysis. First, to what extent did Marx, Weber, Durkheim, and Veblen associate class with collective identification? Second, in what ways are the contributions of these theorists relevant to the current debates on class and identification? Author recommends Bottero, Wendy. 2004. ‘Class Identities and the Identity of Class.’Sociology 38(5): 985–1003. Wendy Bottero’s article Class Identities and the Identity of Class is an excellent review of the current state of class theory, particularly as it concerns class identification. While our article focuses primarily on the contribution of classical theorists to the debate on class and identification, Bottero addresses key contemporary developments to class theory and what they represent for the future meaning of class. Bourdieu, P. 1984. Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Pierre Bourdieu’s Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste offers readers a complex look into class identification. Bourdieu examines class iden