M ost treatments of the relation between cul- ture and social structure—going all the way back to the classic statements by Marx and Engels (1939) and Durkheim ([1933] 1997:215, 276)—aim at explaining the connection between these two domains by highlighting the ways in which patterns of social relations affect the composition and structure of cultural systems (Bearman 1993; Douglas 1978; Martin 2002). Some of the more ambitious projects, such as formulations in which large-scale cultural for- mations are linked to social structure broadly conceived (i.e., Swanson 1967), have been crit- icized for positing an unwarranted “reflection model” of the relation between culture and soci- ety (Wuthnow 1985), in which culture is seen as somehow being isomorphic with social struc- ture but the mechanisms that produce this con- vergence are left unspecified (Martin 1997:5). Bourdieu, for instance, dismissed this stance as the “short-circuit fallacy” (quoted in Wacquant 1989:33), whereby a “direct link” is How C Cultural T Tastes S Shape P Personal N Networks Omar Lizardo University of Notre Dame This article examines the relationship between different forms of cultural taste and the density of social contacts across alternative types of network relations classified by average tie strength. The author builds on Bourdieu’s ([1986] 2001) classic statement on the “forms of capital” (economic, social, and cultural) and the conversion dynamics among them, and on DiMaggio’s (1987) connection between cultural tastes and sociability. He hypothesizes that (1) in addition to cultural tastes being determined by network relations, cultural tastes are used to form and sustain those networks. Furthermore he expects that (2) highbrow culture taste will be less likely to be converted into social capital beyond immediate strong-tie circles due to its more restricted, “asset- specific” nature. Because of its generalized appeal, taste for popular culture will be more likely to be associated with weak-tie network density. The results broadly support these hypotheses: a model that specifies an effect of culture on network density provides a better fit to the data than the traditional conception of networks as determining taste. In addition using log-linear models and instrumental-variable methods, I show that popular culture consumption has a positive impact on weak-tie network density but not strong-tie network density, while highbrow culture consumption selectively increases strong-tie density but has no appreciable effect on weak ties, net of standard socioeconomic variables. These findings help to shed light on the mechanisms that translate mastery of different types of cultural knowledge into integration across distant social positions or closure around strong group boundaries. The author also discusses the implications of the results for current models describing the transformation of cultural into social resources. AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW, 2 2006, V VOL. 7 71 ( (October:778–807) A previous version of this paper was presented at the 2004 American Sociological Association annual meeting in San Francisco. I would like to thank Ron Breiger, John Levi Martin, John Sonnett, Steve Lee, James Montgomery and the members of the University of Arizona Graduate Student Culture Research Group for helpful comments and sugges- tions on a previous draft of this paper. Last but not least, I am also grateful for the helpful suggestions and incisive criticisms of Jerry Jacobs and the anonymous ASR reviewers, which undoubtedly made this a better paper than it otherwise would have been. All remaining errors and omissions remain the author’s sole doing. Direct all correspondence to Omar Lizardo, University of Notre Dame, Department of Sociology, 810 Flanner Hall, Notre Dame IN 46566 (olizardo@nd.edu). Delivered by Ingenta to : University of Notre Dame Thu, 30 Nov 2006 00:52:18