Inequalities in Cultural Capital in Tehran

Cultural turn in contemporary society has undoubtedly turned culture into a major arena for the production and representation of social gaps and inequalities. The interplay of inequalities in access to the capitals and urban life has rarely been a topic for systematic empirical studies in Iran. Relying on a large scale representative survey recently conducted in Tehran, this paper aims to reveal the unequal distribution of cultural capital in Tehran and also to reveal the mechanisms the residents employ both to produce and to display cultural capital. The findings while clarifying the prospects of inequalities in different dimensions of urban cultural capital, highlight the ways cultural capital both affects and is affected by urban [physical] spaces and urban life. This conclusion while uncovering some of the inadequacies related to
current cultural capital literature, offers new concepts and spheres by which social inequalities can be conceived in the context of Iranian society.