2. ● Conspicuous or visible leisure is engaged in for the
sake of displaying and attaining social status. The
concept comprises those forms of leisure that seem
to be fully motivated by social factors, such as taking
long vacations to exotic places and bringing
souvenirs back.
● Conspicuous leisure is observed in all societies
where stratification exists.
● Conspicuous leisure contributes to the glorification
of non-productivity, thus validating the behavior of the
most powerful classes and leading the lower classes
to admire rather than revile the leisure class. This
aids the leisure class in retaining their status and
material position.
Conspicuous leisure
3. ● Conspicuous leisure is the benchmark for determining elite
status and serves as a symbolic statement that one is above
laboring.
● Lower-status groups emulate the leisure class in an
attempt to increase their own status. Veblen discusses how
women are exploited by men through vicarious conspicuous
consumption, waste, and leisure, where women perform the
conspicuous activity of leisure, and men benefit in terms of
status from these activities.
● For example, ideals of feminine beauty (frailty, weakness,
paleness—indicating that the woman is not able to labor),
certain restrictive fashions that incapacitate labor, and the
removal of women from socially visible productive labor all
contribute to the good name of the household and its master.
Conspicuous leisure
4. ● The siesta in Spain and Italy allows
businesses to close four hours in the
afternoon to allow sleeping on the job.
● Management consultants are
coming around to the idea that a long
break at midday can lead to higher
productivity.
● Even American companies are now
providing single beds in the office for
naps to improve efficiency when
awake.
Conspicuous
Leisure
5. ● Thorstein Veblen born
in 1857, was a sociologist
who studied how business
people handled off-days.
● He propounded the role
of vacations, the state of
not working, in his book,
Theory of the Leisure
Class.
Thorstein Veblen
6. ● In The Theory of the Leisure Class
(1899), American economist
Thorstein Veblen (1857–1929)
distinguishes between two classes of
individuals, the class that is focused
on productive labor and the leisure
class, a division that developed
during the barbarian/feudal stage of
society.
● Veblen incorporates culture into
this division with an understanding of
production and consumption,
material life, status, and economic
stratification.
The Theory of the Leisure Class
7. ● According to Veblen,
modern economic behavior
was based on the struggle
for competitive economic
standing, as the aristocratic
consumption of luxuries
served as a litmus test for
elite status during the peak
of capitalist
industrialization.
The Theory of the Leisure Class
8. ● The leisure class itself
consists of social elites,
businesspeople, and
captains of industry
(those at the top of the
social-class pyramid),
who engage in
pecuniary activities that
detract from the
productive aspect of
society.
The Theory of the Leisure Class
