読者たちのディスタンクシオン？

2010 年練馬調査データからのテイスト理論の再検討

抄録

In this paper, we examine the role of literary taste among youth in Japan. Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of taste assumes that individuals are ranked according to their taste from the most refined to the most vulgar. Reading novels appears to be a perfect example of Bourdieu’s theory, as reading is taught directly in school. However, Bourdieu’s theory seems to be at odds with the Japanese situation, where influential literary critics have witnessed the ‘downfall’ of onceesteemed literature that, as they saw it, has now ceased to be relevant to society and become merely entertainment. 　　Even when the popularity of“ light novels” and“ cell phone novels” caused controversy in the 2000s regarding their quality due to the former’s anime/ manga-like characters and the latter’s unconventional style of writing and excessively sentimental plots, scholars and journalists countered the disparaging discourse on these supposedly “lowbrow” novels. Although Bourdieu assumes individuals to be taste-sensitive and taste to be a fundamental capital in every field of cultural practice, for the case of novel reading in Japan, this very assumption must be called into question. 　　Drawing from the 2010 Youth Culture and Communication Survey in Nerima （Tokyo）, we explore whether literary taste is still relevant to the sense of distinction among young novel readers. We examine the difference between selfcategorized novel hobbyists and non-hobbyist novel readers, and we test whether what they read accounts for the gap between the two groups. 　　The findings show that the types of novels are relevant to their self-categorization. In particular, those who read classical novels are more likely to regard reading novels as a hobby and those who read cell-phone novels are less likely. Against literary critics’ skepticism about the cultural authority of literature in Japan, these findings indicate that even urban youth conform to the conventional hierarchy of literary taste.