The Short Life of the New Middle Classes in Portugal

Authors

  • Alice Duarte University of Porto

Keywords:

anthropology of consumption, new middle classes, crisis, Portugal, in-depth interviews, ethnography

Abstract

This article is based on research addressing the process of consumption as cultural practice; that is, the goods and services consumed are evaluated in terms of their resocialization by social actors. The research covered 24 households from Portugal's urban middle class and involved in-depth interviews and ethnography. This text explains some consumption practices and correlative cultural expressions of the new Portuguese middle classes, which confirms their very recent expansion, as well as their undeniable weakness, particularly financially. The strong tendency of this social segment for the remediado (person/household in an average, modest financial situation, with just enough for their needs), together with the current financial crisis, point to a rather short life for Portugal's new middle classes.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Downloads

Published

2015-11-30

How to Cite

Duarte, A. (2015). The Short Life of the New Middle Classes in Portugal. Anthropologica, 57(2), 557–570. Retrieved from https://cas-sca.journals.uvic.ca/index.php/anthropologica/article/view/451

Issue

Vol. 57 No. 2 (2015): Shamanism, Religious Renewal and Empowerment in Indigenous Societies / Consent, Collaboration, Treaty: Toward Anti-Colonial Praxis in Indigenous Settler Research Relations

Section

Articles

License

Copyright (c) 2021 Alice Duarte

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

Authors contributing to Anthropologica agree to release their articles under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 Unported license. This licence allows anyone to share their work (copy, distribute, transmit) and to adapt it for non-commercial purposes provided that appropriate attribution is given, and that in the event of reuse or distribution, the terms of this license are made clear.

Authors retain copyright of their work and grant the journal right of first publication.

Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.