Often, magazine profile writers claim that, unlike other profiles of a celebrity, their profile has found the key to unlocking that celebrity's life. That key is always a generic abstract principle-- courage, hard work, family trauma, etc. In the case of the NY Times Magazine profile of Sofia Coppola, the abstract principle is "good taste," which the profile conceptualizes as effortless but trained, individualistic but group-oriented, and timeless but timely.
Here, some clips from the profile (left) and some commentary on the idea of taste, drawn from an old college paper of mine and a random website (right):
| She has inherited many of [her father’s] talents -- his taste, his ability to surround himself with talented friends, his ambition and entrepreneurship.
[Marc Jacobs on Sofia:] “She loves fashion and music and art and film, and she is able to combine them in a way that all seems to be quite natural.” | In 18th century England, as the Early Modern yielded completely to the Modern, “taste” emerged as the new and dominant form of capital. And while taste foregrounds subjectivity to the detriment of traditional symbols of class standing, it has also become a manifestation of class standing that "naturalizes" class. |
| This day, and most days, she had carefully chosen all aspects of her life, detail by detail, in what appeared to be an effortless manner. | "Because it is misperceived as spontaneous and disinterested, taste functions as an effective instrument of class domination and reproduction. The definition of "good taste" is part of [the struggle] for the monopolization of symbolic violence, which arbitrarily imposes as natural and legitimate the evaluative standards and perceptual categories of the dominant class. |
| [Zoe Cassavetes on Sofia:] “I said, 'Do you want to have dinner?' She said, 'O.K., do you want to go to Jean Lafitte?' -- which was a bistro on 58th Street, where I went all the time. When she said Jean Lafitte, we had an instant bond. We spoke the same language.''
''My first impression of Sofia,'' Jonze recalled recently, ''was that she was quiet and graceful. And that she had taste, and when I say taste, I mean judgment in really subtle things. She always knew the feeling she wanted to convey in everything she did. And that's true taste.'' | "Mastering the complex and subtle nuances of good taste requires a long process of familiarization. Since this process is carried out primarily within the family and in elite schools, good taste only comes "naturally" to upper class children who have long been exposed to it. In everyday interaction, displays of a taste for "difficult" objects signal membership in the privileged class while a taste for common, vulgar, or less refined ones betrays membership in the dominated class." [more>] |
So true... nicely phrased. The extent to which the type of signifier you describe inheres in Manhattan culture sometimes makes me want to scream. The naturalization of social exclusion is poison. Thanks for reminding me I am not alone in wanting no part of it.
(I still hope S. Coppola's movie with Bill Murray doesn't suck.)
Posted by: sam on September 10, 2003 12:00 AM
daily tired