This paper addresses how neighbourhoods operate as opportunity structures in enabling cultural participation, and therefore how unequal access to cultural facilities might affect differences in levels of participation and profiles of participants. There is an extensive literature on neighbourhood effects which identifies how where people live can affect their life chances, including their participation in a range of activities, but this has not been applied to cultural participation. Sociological theory explores the importance of social stratification of cultural consumption, but has largely ignored the role of place. In this paper the explanations of cultural participation offered by the existing sociological literature are extended to incorporate the influence of access to cultural infrastructure.An innovative accessibility index for museums and galleries in London, using online searches to account for their attractiveness, is linked to the Taking Part Survey, and used in a logistic regression model predicting attendance. Alongside social stratification, the model identifies characteristics of the neighbourhood that are significant, including deprivation, access to public transport, and, importantly, access to museums and galleries. Improved access has a strong positive relationship with 2 attendance, which varies according to the qualifications and ethnic group of the respondent: those with degrees are most likely to attend, but the relationship with access also operates for those with fewer qualifications, who according to dominant explanations have little disposition to attend. The implications of the substantial spatial inequity in investment in museums and galleries is discussed.

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Cultural and creative industries are currently narrated as one of the greatest forces for openness and social mobility that Britain has (Hancock 2016). However, there is little, if any, evidence to support this position. Recent research has suggested the creative and cultural occupations are dominated by those from professional or managerial backgrounds (O’Brien et al 2016, Oakley et al 2017), with cultural theorists arguing this reflects declining rates of social mobility over time (Banks 2017). This paper provides the first empirical assessment of claims made by policy and cultural theory concerning changing patterns of social mobility into cultural and creative occupations. We use the England and Wales Longitudinal Study, along with three birth cohort studies, to offer the first analysis of social mobility into cultural and creative occupations over time. We demonstrate that: cultural and creative occupations have always been characterised by overrepresentations of those from privileged social origins, with little evidence of a classless meritocracy; rates of absolute social mobility are declining in these occupations, contradicting policymakers’ faith in a ‘meritocracy’ for talented individuals aiming to work in artistic and cultural jobs; this decline in absolute levels of social mobility is in contrast to the stability in relative social mobility, indicating there was no ‘golden age’ for social mobility into cultural occupations. These three points illustrate the importance of occupational perspectives on cultural and creative industries and the value of sociological analysis for public policy questions in this area. In particular, the lack of social fluidity in the occupations producing culture is a key issue for future public policy intervention. The paper concludes with suggestions for future research on longevity of cultural careers and the importance of gender using the Longitudinal Study dataset.

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Cultural Studies has drawn attention to the way that cultural and creative industries are marked by significant inequalities. This article explores how these inequalities are maintained, through fieldwork with senior men making decisions in cultural and creative industries. Drawing on 32 interviews with senior men across a range of cultural and creative industry occupations, conducted as part of a larger (N = 237) project, the analysis shows that misrecognition and outright rejection of inequalities are now not the norm. Rather, ‘inequality talk’ and the recognition of structural barriers for marginalised groups is a dominant discourse. However, individual careers are still explained by gentlemanly tropes and the idea of luck, rather than by reference to structural inequalities. The distance between the discourse of career luck and ‘inequality talk’ helps to explain the persistence of exclusions from the workforce for those who are not white, middle class origin, men. This has important implications for inequalities in cultural production and consumption, and in turn for wider social inequality.