Status acts as an automated motor driving permanent cultural change

Evidence

But as we’ll see, status and culture are so intertwined that we can’t understand how culture works without understanding status. And the best way to understand the status structures of society is to observe how they manifest in cultural patterns. The idea of their inexorable linkage dates back at least to the economist Thorstein Veblen’s writings about conspicuous consumption in the Gilded Age, in which he posited that wealthy people buy expensive things to reveal they can buy expensive things. But the interactions go much deeper: Status shapes our aspirations and desires, sets standards for beauty and goodness, frames our identities, creates collective behaviors and morals, encourages the invention of new aesthetic sensibilities, and acts as an automated motor for permanent cultural change. — W. David Marx, Status and Culture, 27

But as we’ll see, status and culture are so intertwined that we can’t understand how culture works without understanding status. And the best way to understand the status structures of society is to observe how they manifest in cultural patterns. The idea of their inexorable linkage dates back at least to the economist Thorstein Veblen’s writings about conspicuous consumption in the Gilded Age, in which he posited that wealthy people buy expensive things to reveal they can buy expensive things. But the interactions go much deeper: Status shapes our aspirations and desires, sets standards for beauty and goodness, frames our identities, creates collective behaviors and morals, encourages the invention of new aesthetic sensibilities, and acts as an automated motor for permanent cultural change. Culture is embodied in the products, behaviors, styles, meanings, values, and sensibilities that make up the human experience—and it is status that guides their creation, production, and diffusion. — W. David Marx, Status and Culture, 27

Categorization

• XREF: Links to the Milgrom and social-capital material in the library — all about how uncoordinated self-interest produces organized collective outcomes. — connects to: Status seeking acts as an invisible hand generating culture — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 25; Shrinking subcultures grow more extreme as core members chase escalating status — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 426; Status anxiety can delay adoption of well-known useful technologies by years — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 529 (+1 more)
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 27