bourdieu lecture; an introduction

7/29/2019 Bourdieu lecture; an introduction

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Pierre Bourdieu: structure andagency

Genetic structuralismReflexive Sociology

(method)

Cultural Capital


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[Linguistic] Structuralism

(revisiting lecture 1)

Concerned with the underlying structure of meaning in language

(and human thought)

Ferdinand de Saussure (1924) 'Course in General Linguistics' "language is above all a system of signs and therefore we must

have recourse to the science of signs if we are to define it

properly'?

Semiology (Gr. Semeion - signs) - the science of systems of

signs

Signs includes noises, gestures, conventions, practices, belief

systems, images, 'symbolic rituals, etiquette, military signals' etc.


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Structuralism (2)

the meanings of 'signs' is not natural nor do they have an intrinsicmeaning. Rather they are 'arbitrary', and signs are assigned

meaning This leads one to think about the functional rules and conventions

which govern the assignment of meaning to signs e.g. whygestures are given their meaning.

The 'arbitrariness' of signs differs according to their role/status assytems of communication - i.e. traffic lights vs literary texts and

advertisements. Each sign constitutes a 'signifier' and signified'. Semiology

concerned with the causal link between them (what causes themto be linked, seeing as meaning is arbitrary).


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Structuralism (3) Application to social

sciencesClaude Levi-Strauss (anthropologist) 1961. Trying to make

explicit the implicit knowledge that enables people to

communicate, interpret and understand one another's behaviour. Application of the construction of meaning in relation to power and

ideology (Roland Barthes - Myth Today).

Application of the construction of meaning in relation to social

practice, cultural signification, class status (Bourdieu).

How do signs become status symbols? What do these meanings

and processes say about the organisation of class, status and

hierarchy in capitalist society?


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Three aspects of Bourdieus work

1. Influence of Structuralism on Bourdieus idea of geneticstructuralism. Power relations are embedded in the tissue ofeveryday life. See Bourdieu, P. (1993) Language and Symbolic

Power. Harvard University Press. Mass

2. Reflexive Sociology (method)

- theory must grow out of empirical research

- participant observation

- reflexive sociology

See Bourdieu, P. (1990) The Logic of Practice and Bourdieu, P.(1977/1972) Outline of a Theory of Practice.

3. The symbolic capital of lifestyles in the field of cultural production

- class, commodities, power and culture

- habitus, field and capital (economic, social and cultural capital)

See Bourdieu, P (1974{1979}) Distinction: A Social Critique of theJudgement of Taste, Routledge, London


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Key concepts

Field

HabitusCultural capital

Practice

Distinctions and class


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Reflexive Sociology (method)

'Outline of a Theory of Practice' (1977{1972}) Bourdieus hermeneutic (relating to the whole)

understanding of the way people read, understand, interpretand live their everyday lives an objective analysis of the structures which frame, limit,

control and influence social life. links the objective with the subjective social spheres.

Breaking down the traditional sociological dualisms Argued for complexity of people's activities as

simultaneously shaping and being shaped by the socialworld.


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Objectivism and subjectivism the

problems

Objectivism(reproduction of the world via structures)erroneously searched for grand explanations

Critical of structural theories of the left (Althusserian Marxism)and right (Parsons)

Objectivism erroneously adopts a mechanistic view of humanconduct, ignoring the extent to which social life is a practicalachievement by skilful actors (Bourdieu, 1977: 22-23)

Subjectivism: (reproduction of the world by individuals)

Critical of phenomenology and SI For assuming that socialrelations and values emerged automatically from socialsituations but were untouched by social structures, influencesor forces.


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Agency

individuals exercised agency but within existing

social conventions, values and sanctions Individuals do not create the world anew

Behaviour is socially constrained

our social interactions are already influenced

by social predispositions, conventions, rules

etc.


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and Structure

Structure (the field) social relations were not reproduced in a

vacuum, but as an outcome of power relations.

The 'field' of social relations refers to the areas of social life wherestrategies are used in the struggle for resources.

Therefore, he viewed the relations between practice (what we do

in our immediate environment) and the field (the larger

parameters of power relations) as being intrinsically linked

that sociological methods had to observe both of these dynamics

together.


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Sociological method

B adopted two sociological methods and rules which

would be attentive to the complex interactions between

social groups and social structures.

Participant observation in which the researcher should be concerned with the different power relations shaping

social life, and the most receptive way to observe these was

by closely observing social practices Takes account of the way people skilfully improvise their social

roles or practices


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Practice continued reflexive

sociology

Reflexive sociology

B concerned with the different power relationsbetween researcher and the researched

Rejected researcher/researcheddivide

Researcher is part of the social world and must

adopt a critical attitude to own practice


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Practice

Is neither unconscious or conscious - people know howto act in daily activities

People draw from doxa (doxic experience) - i.e. their'taken for granted world beyond reflection' (1977).

The social world into which we are born and in whichwe operate in everyday life is already structured

Each area of social life has its own social order We need unpack the nature of social rules, practices

and strategies and the intuitive, automatic way peopleread and understand the social world in which theyoperate.


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Practice (2)

we engage in the social world using a combination ofour 'practical sense' and 'doxa'

agency involves individuals strategically engaging inand manipulating the rules of the social situations -playing a game

going to university and studying for a degree can be

seen as a game with very definite rules Students students develop a 'feel for the game';, I.e

what are inappropriate, good and bad moves. Theydevelop skills to play the game intuitively


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This is an example of habitus at

work

the second-nature, understanding of what ishappening, is crucial to understanding social life.

B refers to it as habitus. Habitus; a set of dispositions resulting in particular

practices, improvisations, bodily attitude, gestures, etc.which provide the 'feeling for the game'.

Like Blumer and Giddens, but Bourdieu has a deeperanalysis of the meaning of cultural sings and meaning,strategic action and class power.


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Cultural capital

Classical Marxism - the accumulation of profit widens the divisionbetween those who own and control the means of production, andthose who rely on waged labour.

B extends the analysis to everyday cultural reproduction and to anotion of cultural power as a key sphere for reproducing classdomination.

Access to higher education is a good example The cultural goods with which students play the game of

University life University life overlaps with other social fields and other areas of

social privilege (private education or a good state school; familysituation; social aspirations; access to funding; 'ability' and

government policy).


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Cultural capital (2)

Getting a place at your chosen University is based on strategicstruggle to attain different forms of capital (the struggle to get toUniversity starts years before you sit your matriculations).

Educational awards (degrees) are a form of cultural capital whichare traded for money,good jobs, social prestige.

Symbolic capital is one of the most significant forms of capital. Possessors of symbolic capital are not only able to justify their

possession of other forms of capital but are able to change thestructure and rules by which the field operates.

Thus higher education can be seen as a valued commodity whichreproduces the three different elements of capital (economic,cultural and social)


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Class and the social sieve -

Distinction

Pierre Bourdieu's attempts to understand social inequality andwhy it is that people acquiesce to power and being dominatedwithout resisting.

He did not find the answer primarily in economic classes or thestate, but in culture and ideology.

And how social classes are reproduced through symbolicdomination and the education system

Bourdieu, P (1974{1979)) Distinction: A Social Critique of theJudgement of Taste, Routledge, London

The relations between taste and class in French society. Surveybetween 1963-8, 1217 subjects.

People asked to specify their personal tastes in music, art,

theatre, home decor, social pastimes, literature etc.


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Distinctions (2)

B held that there still was a dominant valuation in favour of 'high-culture' which is still used to express social distinction.

Good taste is dependent on a separation from the necessities ofdaily labour. This distance is produced by the status of the bourgeois classes

as being separate from manual productive labour. class power and social inequality are reproduced at athe cultural

and social level. This occurred apparently without resistance or social conflict, Is class elitism evident in recent controversies about the BBC

dumbing down, complaints about the 'illiteracy' of youngergenerations and the establishment of 'Mickey-Mouse degrees?


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Bourdieus contribution

Linked the construction of taste and cultural practice

to class distinctions

It advances Marxist sociology.

Develops the concept of economic, cultural,

educational and social capital within a unified

framework. Through this, a better understanding of

the reproduction of class and status

Furthermore, it also advances Bourdieu's general

theory of society and social agency

bourdieu lecture; an introduction

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