Date: Thu, 08 Jul 1999 08:07:27 -0400 From: =?iso-8859-1?Q?Mich=E8le?= Ollivier <ollivier-AT-uottawa.ca> Subject: Re: Bourdieu the "Top Guy" > >To reverse the argument: it could be said that those who refuse to >consider the social and historical conditions that (nonconsciously) >determine their thought are the mystifiers, the enemies of reason and >of democracy. ...this is the basic claim of all "materialist" tendencies >from Marx, to Freud and beyond, as I see it. The analysis of social and historical conditions might provide an explanation of *why* we're holding some thoughts, but it does not address the question of whether these thoughts are right or wrong. When I was a graduate student, I had a teacher who was strongly against Marxist theory. Her family had emigrated from the Soviet Union after years of persecution. Having studied sociology in Québec and in France in the late 1970s and 1980s, I had been totally immersed in Marxist thought. She often used this sociological explanation to dismiss my arguments whenever I challenged her in class. She refused to apply the same explanation to her own arguments, and she always used this tactic to put an end to our discussions. It was the opposite of reason and democracy. In a recent paper, Christine Delphy cirticizes Bourdieu's epistemology. She calls his position the "Munchhausen" : "en effet, il réussit =E0 fixer l'attention de l'audience sur le remarquable travail de cape historiciste qu'il réalise de la main gauche, de sorte que personne ne voit le petit geste de la main droite (l'auto-socio-analyse) par lequel il s'auto-tire par les cheveux et s'auto-dépose en s=FBreté sur la berge tandis que le fleuve de l'histoire nous emporte." In short, he dismisses his critics by showing the sociological underpinnings of their arguments while refusing to apply the same procedure to his own nalyses. Mich=E8le Ollivier >George Free >********************************************************************** >Contributions: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu >Commands: majordomo-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu >Requests: bourdieu-approval-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu > *********************************************** Département de sociologie, Université d'Ottawa C.P. 450, Succ. A, Ottawa (Ontario), K1N 6N5 tél.: (613) 562-5800, poste 1383 *********************************************** ********************************************************************** Contributions: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu Commands: majordomo-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu Requests: bourdieu-approval-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
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