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AP U.S. History Exam 1.29. How might someone who believed in Social Darwinism respond to the image?
AP U.S. History Exam 2.29. Those in Veblen's "leisure class" justified their wealth by citing the theory of...what?
How did the wealthy justify their status and privilege? Other than the customary way of having large gold statues built in their likeness with sign...
AP U.S. History Exam 2.29 166 Views
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AP U.S. History Exam 2.29. Those in Veblen's "leisure class" justified their wealth by citing the theory of...what?
Transcript
- 00:00
[ musical flourish ]
- 00:03
And here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by conspicuous consumption,
- 00:07
the sickness that makes you crave attention.
- 00:10
All right.
- 00:11
[ mumbles ]
Full Transcript
- 00:16
All right, Theory of the Leisure Class, 1899.
- 00:19
All right, and the question:
- 00:20
Those in Veblen's leisure class justified their wealth
- 00:23
by citing the theory of... what?
- 00:25
And here are your potential answers.
- 00:27
[ mumbles ] Huh. All right.
- 00:31
Well, members of the leisure class were not shy about money,
- 00:34
but because they had so much of it compared to the rest of society,
- 00:38
they often needed justification for, uh...
- 00:40
just how wealthy they were.
- 00:42
So did the leisure class justify their wealth
- 00:44
by citing the theory of A - conspicuous consumption?
- 00:48
Though it sounds like it would be used to describe a competitive year,
- 00:52
conspicuous consumption referred to those who displayed
- 00:55
their wealth by acquiring luxury goods.
- 00:58
Anyway, it ain't A.
- 01:00
Could the leisure class have justified their wealth
- 01:02
by citing the C - cult of domesticity?
- 01:06
Well, huh, the cult of domesticity was a push-back
- 01:09
against women working in factories,
- 01:11
not a justification of wealth. So get rid of C.
- 01:14
Did the leisure class justify their financial status by citing D -
- 01:18
social gospel?
- 01:20
Well, actually, social gospel was a movement aimed at
- 01:23
helping those trapped at the other end of the financial spectrum.
- 01:26
So it's not D.
- 01:28
That means the leisure class justified their wealth through B -
- 01:30
Social Darwinism.
- 01:32
The leisure class preferred to justifiy their wealth by attributing it
- 01:35
to their natural strength as businesspeople.
- 01:37
This idea was supported by Social Darwinism,
- 01:40
which applied the idea of survival of the fittest
- 01:43
in an economic and social sphere.
- 01:46
So B is the correct answer.
- 01:47
Though lower classes saw this justification as
- 01:50
pretty convenient, the wealthy relied on Social Darwinism
- 01:53
to help explain the origin of their...
- 01:56
specie.
- 01:57
[ moo ]
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