Critique of the relationship between academic capital and artistic habitus

This research is a study of effects of academic capital in forming of artistic habitus in Iran. The main assumption of this article which is induced from Pierre Bourdieu’s theories is based on this believe that formation of artistic habitus or “the love of art” and legitimate taste in individuals is initially has a close relationship with their level of education as institutionalized cultural and then their social origin. institutionalizedstate، a form of objectification which must be set apart because، as will be seen in the case of educational qualifications، it confers entirely original properties on the cultural capital which it is presumed to guarantee. Despite of importance of social origin، the main focus of this article is on the effective role of education in formation of artistic habitus. This research is an attempt to evaluate this theory in Iran. To evaluate this theory، two categories، “holder of high academic educational” and “art lovers”، have been qualitative studied. Studying holder of high academic capital، it can be concluded that holding high academic capital in Iran does not mean to have artistic habitus. Artistic behavior is happening quite randomly among them and this random behavior cannot lead to collect cultural capital and forming artistic habitus. This study shows that aesthetics taste in individuals with high academic capital is far from legitimate taste، since it seems that in Iran. Moreover، their aesthetics taste is very different to legitimate aesthetics taste. Field studying of “art lovers” in Iran shows that forming of artistic habitus generally is based on inherited and family cultural capital or social capital and network of friends. Finally، it can be stated that holding academic capital in Iran cannot be a guarantee for individuals to love art and to be an enthusiast of art. Since، it seems that legitimate arts do not yet find their positions in rough core of Iran culture، and therefore among institutionalized holders of cultural capital existence of artistic habitus may not be a form of accumulation of cultural capital to be considered as sacred behavior. Based on the assumption that culture is composed of regulations، rituals، religion، philosophy، logic، art، literature، and sports to name but a few، art is not considered as the integral part of the Iranian Culture so a transparent and direct relation between education as institutionalized cultural asset and artistic habitus seems farfetched. According to the results، it can be stated that democratization of museum and art places has only led to accumulation of artistic behaviors of permanent audience. General familiarity of people with common arts is very limited. Making relationship with common arts، in addition to democratization of museums and art places and well public informing، require vast attempt of education system and media to link people with artworks. This way random encounter of individuals may lead to regular visits of art places.