The Beautiful and Condemned: Taste Distinction among the Singapore Middle Class

Abstract

Whether it is contesting the legitimacy of Norah Jones as a jazz artist or disagreeing with a critica??s review of a film, these debates over the matter of taste(s) are commonplace in everyday life. Such exchanges often conclude rather diplomatically with a??to each his owna??, and the most popular being the claim that taste is subjective. However, if taste was thought to be entirely subjective and a??to each his owna?? makes redundant any inferiority or superiority of taste practices, why do we even bother with these debates of taste distinction? In the city-state of Singapore, the middle class is often conceived as a coherent and homogenous social entity, both in state discourse and popular imagination. Focusing on practices encompassing leisure activities like the consumption of cultural forms that include literature, film and music, this thesis attempts to show that these processes have consequently inspired a myriad of everyday strategies of distinction and resistance, as practised by members of the middle class.