The modern cult of creative genius was invented to legitimize bourgeois distinction

Evidence

Creativity’s ability to elicit universal good feeling is relatively recent. In the Middle Ages, the term hardly existed in the English lexicon. Words stemming from its Latin root – creatus – typically were employed to refer to God the creator or to his “creations” (Williams 1985, 82–84). It was not until the “birth of the author” in the 18th century that the term was widely applied to a particular human quality or skill. As the bourgeoisie rose to prominence in Europe and demanded cultural artefacts through which they could reckon and display their “distinction” from the proto-proletariat, the work of art gained its stamp of authenticity and transcendental value from the figure of what would, in the 19th century, come to be known as the “creative genius,” the unique and refined imagination of the singular individual (Nelson 2010; Rose 1993; Woodmansee and Jaszi 1994). The mythological figure of the artist was held up as the mirror image of the economic entrepreneur: both individuals imposed their masculine will on the world and begat productive order out of meaningless or wasteful nature (see Wolff 1984). — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 436

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Bourdieu’s distinction theory and the broader argument about how bourgeois culture fabricates authenticity; also parallels how financialization converts creativity into a marketable asset in later chapters. — connects to: The bourgeoisie expropriated popular culture to legitimize its rule; Cultural invention historically arose from small creative enclaves insulated from commerce — W. David Marx, Blank Space: A Cultural History of the…, 851; Race thinking was invented by middle-class intellectuals wanting to democratize noble status — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 117 (+7 more)
• DEFINE: Charts the etymological shift of ‘creativity’ from divine creation to human genius, a useful definitional foundation for the book’s later treatment of creativity as a financialized commodity.

Broader Connections

• The bourgeoisie expropriated popular culture to legitimize its rule #corroborates (0.85)
• Race thinking was invented by middle-class intellectuals wanting to democratize noble status #corroborates (0.80) — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 117
• Intellectuals once held a strategic role legitimating the capitalist status quo. #corroborates (0.80) — Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic…, 853
• Philosophy legitimized material greed through lofty discourse that gained performative power #corroborates (0.78) — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 360
• Capital reabsorbed modernism’s cult of the new as commodity novelty #qualifies (0.75) — Theodor W. Adorno, The Culture Industry, 62
• Bourgeoisie aestheticized crime to mask their own practiced illegalities #exemplifies (0.75) — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 435
• Modernity’s cult of novelty masks a sameness produced by industrial reproducibility. #qualifies (0.73) — Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia, 257
• Cultural invention historically arose from small creative enclaves insulated from commerce #qualifies (0.72) — W. David Marx, Blank Space, 851
• The twenties-thirties antithesis gets reified into image and symbolically reinvents the bourgeoisie #expands (0.72) — Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic…, 627