The Economy of Prestige: Prizes, Awards, and the Circulation of Cultural Value

by James F. English

This is a book about one of the great untold stories of modern cultural the remarkable ascendancy of prizes in literature and the arts. Such prizes and the competitions they crown are almost as old as the arts themselves, but their number and power--and their consequences for society and culture at large--have expanded to an unprecedented degree in our day. In a wide-ranging overview of this phenomenon, James F. English documents the dramatic rise of the awards industry and its complex role within what he describes as an economy of cultural prestige. Observing that cultural prizes in their modern form originate at the turn of the twentieth century with the institutional convergence of art and competitive spectator sports, English argues that they have in recent decades undergone an important shift--a more genuine and far-reaching globalization than what has occurred in the economy of material goods. Focusing on the cultural prize in its contemporary form, his book addresses itself broadly to the economic dimensions of culture, to the rules or logic of exchange in the market for what has come to be called "cultural capital." In the wild proliferation of prizes, English finds a key to transformations in the cultural field as a whole. And in the specific workings of prizes, their elaborate mechanics of nomination and election, presentation and acceptance, sponsorship, publicity, and scandal, he uncovers evidence of the new arrangements and relationships that have refigured that field.

Genres: Nonfiction, Sociology, Economics, Literary Criticism, History, Cultural, Criticism

432 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2005

Reviews

[Hester · Rating 1 out of 5]

I have been trying to read lately while on the elliptical trainer. While some books take more effort (I had to reread certain passages of "Sweet Invention"), any sufficiently interesting book still manages to hold my attention on the trainer. If I want to devote more time to it, I can then read it off the elliptical machine.

This book lost my attention because he does not even consider one of the major reasons for the economy of prestige. There are many of us who want an active cultural life, but don't have much time due to work and family. This means our time to consume culture is limited and we do not have time to consume indiscriminately or to consume the criticism that would guide us to what we may enjoy. The Nobel, Pulitzer, and Booker are fast ways to find out what is going on out there, in a world we can only dip into.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

A model of sociology of literature, a model of what literary studies should do, and also full of funny anecdotes. The talk around prizes is really funny. Of course the book also deflates all prizes forevermore, so that the only grounds remaining for caring about the outcome of the Nobel, Booker, Oscar, etc. are purely instrumental. That's a GOOD thing.

[Helena · Rating 4 out of 5]

veldig interessant om litterære prisar, og om korleis dei er med på å gje kulturell verdi, ville anbefalt til ein ven

[Florence Ivy]

only read the intro but counting it as read anyway

interesting but not what i want to write about for my essay

[versarbre · Rating 4 out of 5]

Obviously, literary critics who do sociological analysis produce much more elegant books than the sociologists. A very well-written book tracing a modern history of cultural prizes. Think about how a historical sociologist might write such a book? It is likely to be too preoccupied with constructing a universal model at the cost of elegant narratives. Instead, Prof. English (what a surname!) goes into historical specificities (ranging from the Greek drama competition to the Nobel prize to the Book Prize to the Academy, etc.) with a few clear viewpoints in mind and on paper. First, the prize is an instrument (the author didn't use this term exactly) for certain institutions to assert authority, exercise the liberty of judgment, mark & highlight distinction, and bestow prestige. Second, the cultural production of value hence is deeply institutional, in other words, internally generating an administrative and bureaucratic aspect. Third, the transformation of economy and society since the 1960s is accompanied by rocket increase of cultural awards in all fields. Fourth, the intensification of globalization produces a "world" taste, more interested in incorporating post-colonial into Europe-based global pantheons than recognizing the anti-colonial older generation (fitting the time of cultural nationalism rather than cultural globalism). Well, the book was written in 2009, the heyday of neoliberal rhetoric. What does the author have to say for even more instable world order?

[Dong Luo · Rating 4 out of 5]

很多时候实体书的书腰都会写着“诺贝尔文学奖获奖/提名者”“多次入围布克奖决赛圈”等字样，奖项背后的经济效益拉动着书籍的贩卖，但也正亦如此我们很多时候会忽略这个作者乃至这本书本身所蕴含的文学意味，而很多时候出版商甚至会刻意回避作者而加上太多奖项或无关人士推荐上去。奥斯卡奖也同理，大家会把很多学院奖或者欧洲三大看得特别重，可学院奖不也出现韦恩斯坦的先例，欧三大不也是小评审团评选嘛。可惜这本书出版于2005年，不然针对韦恩斯坦和米拉麦克斯公司的描写将多得多～另外我一直都不太喜欢托尼莫里森的小说，看完这本书后果然觉得自己的选择不无道理。

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is thorough in its critique of our obsession with prizes, but it adds very little to Bourdieu's critiques about class and taste.

[szymborskalyte · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun and interesting, but thin on insight.

[Dessa · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is what my dissertation WISHES it were.

[Marsha Altman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this book was going to be relevant to my research but it was not. But that's not the book's fault.

[Natasha · Rating 2 out of 5]

The word "prize" doesn't seem real anymore.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

An effective lens to criticize awards

[Sps · Rating 3 out of 5]

PoMo fun. Sentences to be laughed at for their furrowed-brow pronouncements of extremely limited, self- consciously-pluralist scope and meaning. Other sentences of great charm: "An honor such as this can appear so slight as to be more slight than honor." (65)


Since English comes so close to summing up just what he means at several points throughout the book, maybe it's all right that the book ends abruptly and completely sans conclusion. Perhaps as a way of avoiding the which plagues so much nonfiction?

It's fortuitous that I read Bourdieu just a bit ago, because English's book is informed by Bourdieu and references him often. Various books, not just Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, but with frequent use of that book's keyword 'habitus' and the multiple forms of capital. E.g. on the various prizes for porn: "All of these porn prizes claim, in essentially the same way that the corresponding competitors of the Oscars do, to be aligned with a scale of value preferable to that served by the AVNs: less pretentious (meaning less dominated by symbolic or intellectual capital), less corrupt (meaning less dominated by social capital), or less commercial (meaning less dominated by economic capital)." (96)

On the Nobel Prize: "The prize was founded in a thoroughly modern way, by a wealthy industrialist whose private foundation, bearing his name, would serve as the prize's perpetual sponsor, gradually laundering his economic fortune and symbolic reputation through a series of cleansing cultural transactions." (55)

On the actual physical prize-objects: "The prize has depended on this collective belief, since its own currency, however tainted or debased, is understood to derive from this other and purer form, which stands in relation to the economy of prestige as gold did to the cash economy in the days of the gold standard--perfectly magical guarantor of an imperfectly magical system." (212)

[Nickdepenpan123 · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is an eloquent, well written book, but ultimately it descends into the standard, cliched formula that people/academics doing topics like media/cultural/gender studies adopt. That is, long semantic discussions and attempts to define (or redefine) everyday words which have pretty concrete or common sense definitions in the first place, pretentious references to all the predictable people like Bourdieu or Derrida, tiring and abstract parts on culture and symbolism, etc. And all that in chapters starting with a supposedly meaningful quote from Pearl Jam or other popular culture icon. There's little more it adds to what any observant television viewer or newspaper reader has understood about awards and prizes.

OK, it's obvious I don't enjoy that type of book and perhaps I'm biased (and I should say, I couldn't read more than half), but this could have been a good book if it just narrated a rough history of awards with memorable or interesting moments and consequences, without the intellectual aspirations. Alternatively, it could have gone the other way, and analyse the issues relating to the economy of prestige properly (funding of award institutions, tickets and public support, changes in exposure or income of winners and losers, journalist/media/industry connections, tit for tat favours/disfavours, etc). Needless to say, the little that can be found here of all that concrete socio-economic stuff is lost among the abstract talking and unnecessary words.

[Lee]

This is a great -- smart, well-written -- overview of prize-culture and the politics of prize giving, largely but not exclusively in the literary field. It's a model of what good literary criticism should be.

[Eden Sharp · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting analysis and critique on cultural capital, cultural economics and the proliferation and politicisation of prizes and prestige.

[Carmen Thong · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent historical account of the various cultural prizes in the music, film and literature industries. Less theory/analysis in comparison to examples/accounts.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

In honor of Bob Dylan being awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature and putting the answering machine on, an old review, reloaded:

http://theorangepress.com/woid/woid17...

[María Frutilla · Rating 3 out of 5]

Largo y repetitivo, pero está bueno para las clases.

[Rebekah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Why cultural awards (the Nobel Prize, the Man Booker Prize) matter in an economy of prestige.