Niches

The term "niche" usually suggests a defined and limited space, in clear contrast with the global extension of the great social processes. A "niche" cultural form or product is one aimed exclusively at a restricted sector of the public that shares a specific code of values or behaviours. In the not-too-distant past, any cultural performance was naturally situated in the framework of a specific culture, a language, or a system of beliefs and rules shared exclusively by the members of a particular community. It may be useful to draw comparisons on individual aspects, but any value judgement or supposed hierarchy between different periods, cultures and worlds is hardly tenable. Aristotle makes a sharp distinction between the undifferentiated process of life, indicated by the term zoe, and the specific form that life acquires in each concrete case, expressed by the term bios.