This article explores the function and importance of cultural institutions in establishing class distinctions in nineteenth-century New York. Focusing on the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I demonstrate how the Bürgertum, or upper class,established itself as an elite. In sum, this essay is about the class structure of American cities and the emergence of an urban elite. I argue that wealthy, urban citizens in the nineteenth century used philanthropy to assert their social status or to integrate themselves into High Society. Seen in this way, class is neither exclusively nor primarily an economic category but is the product of a set of behavioral patterns of a given group of individuals. The upper class is not defined solely by its wealth but also by the use of wealth. Although one could marry into an established family or invent elaborate family histories, philanthropy was the most essential bourgeois behavioral pattern for consolidating upward mobility.As Sven Beckert has pointed out, only a few in-depth studies about\nAmerican merchants, industrialists, and bankers exist. Historical studies of the emergence and establishment of the upper class are largely absent. In\u0026nbsp;this essay I use the German concept of Bürgertum to investigate the merchants, industrialists, bankers, and lawyers of New York. Furthermore, this essay stands in the tradition of German Sozialgeschichte, which is used in connection with a cultural-historical approach. Accordingly, the focus here is not on\nthe Metropolitan Museum or Metropolitan Opera House as institutions, but on the people who created and sustained those institutions. Quantitative analysis reveals a sociostructural pattern of the philanthropists who donated to them.
Published Paper, 2002
The Journal of Arts Management, Law, and Society, 32(1)
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Abstract