Date: Thu, 01 Aug 1996 15:41:58 +0300
From: Emrah Goker <egoker-AT-Bilkent.EDU.TR>
Subject: Re: PB and New Concepts


At 01:23 PM 9/20/98 +1000, Simon Emsley wrote:

>My reading is that class is central, perhaps the central issue, for
>Bourdieu. In respect to the habitus, it is explained as being historically
>produced individual positions which serve individually and collectively as
>structuring structures. Habitas is therefore central to the way Bourdieu
>understands the social world to be determined. 

I agree. For example, in _The Field of Cultural Production_, I think in the
very first chapter, Bourdieu draws a table where the field of class wraps
around the field of power which wraps around the field of arts and
literature. So the determination (or overdetermination?) of class divisions
seems to be prior, which, I believe, was also the case in _Distinction_.

>In some cases (I'm thinking of Language and Symbolic Power) his discussion
>of the relationship between habitas and politics (and thereby class)
>appears very close to a Marxist approach. (...)
>The central question then becomes `can an idea of class be usefully
>retained independently of Marx's idea of Capital and its particular social
>relations of production'? Bourdieu attempts to answer in the affirmative.
>Your question (2) suggests he has yet to convince you on this subject. My
>feeling is that once capital becomes `wealth' and the notion of surplus
>value is discarded or put aside, that the question of what is driving
>distributional struggles become circular: each social value indicates a
>social cost. Bourdieu attempts to duck the issue of price and utility by
>saying exchanges of social capital other than economic capital are only
>approximations. The inference is that accumulation of social capital by the
>dominant may occur across all fields in addition to those in the economic
>sphere. Nevertheless, in saying the explanation of the social world is
>`everywhere and nowhere', he echoes the ultimately futile neoclassical
>explanation of value, that `prices come from prices'.
>
>Simon Emsley

The sole reason I have been inclined towards Bourdieu was to find myself an
innovative opening of Marxist criticism, and I had quite serious
reservations for post-Marxism (especially for fetishistic anti-essentialism
of Laclau and Mouffe): I prefer, rather than happy-go-lucky deconstruction,
searching for ways to retain the good ol' "class" or "structure" or
"agent"... Aside from aggreing with the points you brought (and some of
them turned on lamps inside my head!), what indeed made me confused about
his use of class was the way he connected the field of power to the field
of class (you see, there is further a problem in using everywhere "the
field of..."). 

When I consider my own case, Islam, and regarding a specific sect of Islam
as a field, I can draw the outline of the field of power, in terms of how
symbolic violence works. Alevi Muslims' religious practices go back to the
days of Shamanism, before Turks have invaded Asia Minor, and these
practices have --although more liberal and egalitarian than Sunni Islam
(that of Arabs)-- very strict definitions of individual habituses. Yet that
field of power cannot be treated as enveloped by the field of class, the
case is so complicated: On the one hand, Alevism has historically been a
stake in the hands of Turkish Socialists against the always-Sunni
bourgeoisie, because of the egalitarian and heterodox philosophy of the
sect. On the other hand, nowadays, the Army (Turkish Army, having
accomplished three coups and one --an ultimatom to the fundamentalist
Islamists last year-- indirect intervention in 38 years, sees itself as the
sole Protector of Democracy, Unity, and Secularism) politicizes the Alevi
sect against the "rising threat" of radical Islam. Thirdly, there are the
poltical Islamists, all Sunni, separated among themselves with respect to
Alevis. Fourthly, there are the dispositions of the Alevis themselves,
which, I think, are not defined by the archaic religious practices, but by
more materialistic ones plus by those imposed by other power groups.

Gosh! It's been a long and boring mail. But you see, I am having great
difficulties in connecting power struggles to class struggles. I wonder if
Bourdieu has anything written on religion. 

Best wishes,
Emrah Goker    

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