Culture and Commerce Quotes

“This unique role of novel cultural goods is related to the nature of these goods, their role in our lives, and their close association with our sense of self and identity—we are defined by, and attempt to define ourselves by, our tastes and preferences in music, literature, clothes, films, and other artistic works, but we are also eager to fit in with others in society. Due to the intense nature of consumers’ relationships with specific cultural goods, they are particularly resistant to accepting new goods without a broader, more intersubjective agreement on new conceptions of appropriateness and value. The introduction of new goods in a market, therefore, necessitates commentary that presents new conceptions of meaning and value, which, if accepted, change our preferences and beliefs.”
― Mukti Khaire, Culture and Commerce: The Value of Entrepreneurship in Creative Industries

“A more realistic understanding [of the value of commentary] is that individual consumers engage in consumption as a social process, deriving psychic benefits from being part of a community with an intersubjectively shared reality.”
― Mukti Khaire, Culture and Commerce: The Value of Entrepreneurship in Creative Industries

“In the case of cultural goods, a particularly complicated equation determines value. The socially constructed nature of the valuation process in markets is most clearly visible in the creative and cultural industries because creative works such as art, books, music, and fashion have greater symbolic than material value. For example, readers value books not because of the physical materials (such as paper and ink) that go into the writing and publishing of a book but because of the ideas that the book symbolizes. Special knowledge is required to interpret, understand, and convey this symbolic value and to evaluate cultural goods; individuals need to understand something about art, the history of aesthetic movements in the art world, and the evaluation criteria for art (for example, originality, rarity, technique) to know not only why works by Raoul Dufy are valued but also why they are less valued (and therefore, also less expensive) than those by his contemporary, the abstract artist Pablo Picasso. Thus, the symbolism inherent to cultural goods—which distinguishes them from strictly utilitarian goods, such as, for example, paintbrushes—creates a barrier to their understanding and valuation.”
― Mukti Khaire, Culture and Commerce: The Value of Entrepreneurship in Creative Industries