The wrong currency

Everyone carries a mix of resources, what Bourdieu calls capital: money (economic), know-how and taste (cultural), useful connections (social), and recognised prestige (symbolic). The two people below carry very different mixes of it. Send each of them into a social setting, a "field", and watch how much standing they command there. Their resources never change from one setting to the next. The only thing that changes is the room they walk into.

Sam, a self-made entrepreneur
Econ
Cult
Social
Symb
Standing here
--
Alex, a career academic
Econ
Cult
Social
Symb
Standing here
--

Drop them into a field

Pick one of the settings above to see how each person's standing is judged there. On the cards, Econ is economic capital, Cult is cultural, Social is social, and Symb is symbolic.