Date: Tue, 20 Jul 1999 15:48:07 +0100 (BST)
From: Karl Maton <kam13-AT-hermes.cam.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: Habitus as process ...


> >Again, I meant the habitus as a whole thing. 
> >
> >On the above ... (a different issue to my question) the tendency to
> >describe different parts of the habitus illustrates that the concept
> >requires development.  Where does this fragmenting end?  It shows how any
> >specific habitus can only be described in terms of its realisations.
>
> I agree very much with Karl Maton's last comment.
>
> But do you exactly mean, Karl, by "habitus as a whole thing" and "Where does
> this fragmenting end?"

BeforeI maketoo much of a mess of the initial question ... it wAs but a
small question which arose because I was trying to write about highe3r
education.  To put the question in context ... In the early postwar period
English HE, I was writing, as an institutional field, was structured along
spatial and temporal lines, in terms of (being very crude) its relations
to a geographical location (universities being oriented towards national
and international recruitment of students, for example; whilst technical
colleges were oriented towards their locality) and in terms of age.  So
there I was, with 'spatial' and 'temporal'.  I also wanted to talk about
how these institutions as a field were structured in terms of the degree
of fit, so to speak, between the habituses of their constituent actors and
those in the field of political power.  Basically, the higher status
universities were subject to very informal relations with the state, an
informality and trust which was based on shared dispositions and
backgrounds.  So, I wondered whether there was an adjective, like spatial
and temporal, which could describe this.  That was all. 

On the second issue, which is perhaps much more interesting
intellectually.  Habitus is a process (though what a stretched version of
this means I don't know) in one sense, but also a structure.  By
fragmenting I referred to the way in which there is a tendency for authors
to start talking of a part of the habitus, as referring to a specific set
of practices, such as linguistic habitus, or educational habitus.  What, I
would ask, does this serve?  By which I mean, what does the added term
here tell us? 

> More: I think habitus is always best understood as a p r o c e s s -.
>
> Ingo
>
> -------------------------------------
> Ing=F3lfur =C1sgeir J=F3hannesson
> d=F3sent vi=F0 H=E1sk=F3lann =E1 Akureyri
> Heima: Drekagili 5, 603 Akureyri
> s. 462 1694, s=EDmi =E1 vinnusta=F0 463 0909
> fax: 463 0999
> heimas=ED=F0a: http://rvik.ismennt.is/~ingo
> Litast um af Hjallh=F3l - vef=FAtg=E1fa greina og erinda, 1981-1998:
> http://rvik.ismennt.is/~ingo/LITAST.HTM
>
> Associate Professor, The University of Akureyri
> Thingvallastraeti 23
> IS-602 Akureyri, Iceland
> tel. 354 462 1694
> e-mail: ingo-AT-unak.is
>
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With best wishes,

Karl

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Karl Maton
School of Education, University of Cambridge
17 Trumpington Street, Cambridge, England  CB2 1QA
 Tel. + 44 (0) 1223 336288
 Fax: + 44 (0) 1223 332894
Email: kam13-AT-cam.ac.uk
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
'Sick down to my heart ... but that's just the way it goes'

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