SOCIAL MOBILITY, CULTURAL CAPITAL AND ITS COMMERCIALIZATION

Abstract

Through the prism of the theoretical views of J. Baudrillard consistently revealing the features of the system of manipulating things as signs characteristic of a modern post-market society, a contradiction is revealed between the functions of consumer goods, which consist in fixing social status and, on the contrary, in reflecting the owner’s aspirations for its dynamics (social mobility). The symbolic exchange value of an item becomes a determining factor in making consumer choice. In these conditions, a society of sign consumption, the commercialization of cultural capital becomes an important source of building up economic capital. It is proposed to understand the cultural capital as an economic resource, which is a set of skills, knowledge, values, principles and patterns of behavior, communication and consumption, recognized by the social environment in the prevailing civilizational and socio-cultural context. The mechanisms of commercialization of cultural capital are shown.