Date: Wed, 08 Dec 1999 17:49:21 +0100 From: Karl Maton <karl.maton-AT-dtn.ntl.com> Subject: A little matter of Bourdieu In this email, I'm picking up on a number of recent postings ... several emails in one. First, Picking up a couple of points which Ziggy raised ... Ziggy Rivkin-Fish wrote: > In short, I have no solutions, only questions. However, it does seem to me > that: > 1) Habitus is not a thing, but a network of loosely connected networks of > expectations and habituated behaviors. Any social situation provide lots of > cues that "trigger" particular networks of the habitus as particularly > salient. This formulation allows seemingly incongruent behaviors (from a > role theoretical and institutional point of view) to take place, and also > allows for creative uses of "less salient" aspects of habitus in response > to various situational flows. Think of a male CEO making a sexual innuendo > to a female senior manager during a business meeting: > Multiple reactions are possible, including ignoring the remark as not > fitting the situation, challenging it for undermining her as manager, using > a standard rejection strategy identified with more casual social > interactions etc. The combinations are endless, but nevertheless will draw > on some habitual logics, even if they are not strongly identified with the > business meeting as a setting or business as a field. I agree, as I think will most people on the list, that habitus is not a thing, though being a network or networks is a different issue unrelated to its ontology. Ontologically, I'd see habitus as a hypothesised generative mechanism (along the lines of Bhaskar's use of this term). As such, what Ziggy describes as 'triggers' are enabling or evoking conditions. (I don't disagree here). What interests me, though, is the question of what the empirical realisations of the habitus, namely practices, can tell us about the habitus of someone. If we can see only the differences between someone's practices at any moments in time or different contexts, and then attribute these empirical differences to different networks or habituses, we're not really doing much more than giving a name to a bundle of practices. If we cannot say what the structure of someone's habitus is at any point, then how we can tell when a different structure or habitus is in play? My point here may be confused by the issue of what the thread is aiming to do. On the one hand, there's the question of discussing the logic of practice. On the other hand, the issue of whether habitus as a concept can be operationalised in empirical research. Habitus as it presently stands seems to me perfectly adequate in any philosophical discussion of the former (wherein one can talk of fuzzy logic etc), but not much more than a useful metaphor in the latter. Unless we can say that the structure of someone's habitus, as realised by their practices, is X (rather than W, Y, or Z), then we're just using the term as shorthand in empirical description. Thus, I don't take issue with the description above of various options being available etc. My question is whether habitus (again I emphasise, as it is presently defined) can allow us to do much more than add another layer, albeit more subtle and suggestive, of empirical description. I believe that Bourdieu's approach is extremely useful for highlighting the need to go further than endless empirical description. > 2) Habitus's multiple networks are associated but not determined by > different fields. However, social interaction never takes place in a field, > but at most an interactional setting that is heavily associated (and > reinforced) by field specific forces. > Again, the business meeting might be heavily determined by business logics > of profit, investment, etc. As well as institutional props ranging from > attire, furniture, codes of ethics, to language. But anyone who has been to > any kind of meeting of any sort knows that they never "succeed" in > filtering out "non-business" elements. Indeed, if they could succeed, real > business would probably be impossible in the first place (But the illusion > might serve its own functions though: to legitimate for example that gender > discrimination does not occur, since it's strictly business). On a different note ... I think I understand what Ziggy's getting at here. Social interaction is of a different kind to the sort of relations Bourdieu is describing as structuring a field - one doesn't need to ever meet others in a field with which one has relations. I'm slightly troubled by the notion of eliding 'field specific forces' with a field as a whole. I agree that there are all sorts of non-specific issues in play, but they are in play in the field, rather than existing outside it. Hmmm. I'm not sure whether I'm being nitpicking or not, as I think Ziggy's point is very interesting. Will have to give it some thought. -------------- Now I know where the expression reindeer games comes from ... most festive and apposite for the time of year. (I received my first Xmas card on the first of December). On this note, may I send a very warm festive greeting to everyone on the list. There's been some symbolic violence at times, but I find that it is through listservs that one often finds ideas that one didn't know one had and can guage the uses and misuses of ideas. So, thanks to everyone who has participated, and my warm encouragement to all lurkers to join in, whatever you have to say. ------------- > Sorry debbie, > Sorry if my remark had an edge to it. But i must strongly disagree with > your populism which is opposed to the scientific practice and habitus which > Bourdieu is attempting to institute which is tied to language. Which is not > anti-political, it occupies a different sphere and field and can be used > within political discussions, as a tool for thinking, or in the personae of > the public academic, but they don't and can't occur at the same at the same > time-I think this is much of Bourdieu's critique of Sartre. This again is > not an opposition..you are the one who focuses on one Bordieu to the > exclusion or others and flames others who might be following a different > trajectory of research and interest. This is an academic list and the > theorist I mentioned are academics who have something to say and should be > acknowledeged. And since this is a Bourdieu newsgroup, you should at least > acknowledge Bourdieu's critique of plain simple everyday language that makes > up the spontaneous sociology that is rampant in the mass media, the > university and gets a lot of crap published etc. I'm not putting myself forward as some kind of referee here, but I think there is a slight confusion going on, and Kent and Deborah may be about to argue against positions not held by the other. Again, I'd emphasise that it is not simple everyday language itself which is the problem. Indeed, much of what I would describe as spontaneous sociology is couched in extremely obscure and jargonised terms. It is what is being said that is just as important as how it is being said. This may be a matter of national context - the States may be a different case. But in British sociology, I think there is both a valorisation of simple language and of simplistic ideas. Simplistic ideas may be, as I've said, couched in the most incredibly obscurantist terms. If difficult language were enough, then Weber, Durkheim and Marx would be passed over as useless and the sophists of philosophical-literary speculation would be on a pedestal. (Oh, heck, I've just realised that many of them are!). Conversely, a term isn't essentially or intrinsically 'jargon' - it is the use to which it is put. Much difficult language on writing acts as little more then intellectual camouflage for common-sense. --------------- Hey, Tobin! There I go, emailing a reply and I find you've already covered what I was going to say. Robert Merton wickedly called this 'preemptive plagiarism' (ha ha). (On a tangent, has anyone read his highly enjoyable _On the Shoulders of Giants_?). Tobin Nellhaus wrote: > > While I'm here, Debbie and Karl M have a point about the distinction between > "style and content," or perhaps we should say "diction and analysis." For > example, I'd say Marx has a pretty sophisticated analysis of capitalism, one > that requires careful thinking, but he's also very readable (wasn't there a > time when _Capital_ could be found in workers' homes?). Anyway, not > everyone on this list is an academic. > ------------ This is my last on the current thread. We seem to have gone way off-thread and into something which is not at all like discussion or debate. The list is about Bourdieu and his ideas and their use and our use of them. May I suggest, in a friendly manner, that when threads become personal, that they then become emails between the two or more persons in direct conflict. Not only does this save others from having dozens of emails in their Inbox (putting more money into the hands of Internet Service Providers - personally, it is taking ages at present for my emails to download), but it also can help to lower the temperature by removing the amount at stake. For example, Kent and I had a brief discussion off-list which enabled us to see exactly whether we were actually even disagreeing or not, and if so on what. Lastly, it also might avoid putting others off contributing to the list. Now, before I get flamed for making these suggestions, I emphasise that they are merely that: friendly suggestions. My question is: who does it serve for us to be engaged in personal conflicts? And I think that too often academic debate is becoming personal. If anyone wants to have a go at me for suggesting all this, please do so off-list. My email is at the top and bottom of this post. (i.e. don't use the 'Reply' button or command as it will be sent to the list, and I won't respond on this subject there). Take care everyone and have a great new year, May your computer not crash on Jan 1st! With best wishes, Karl Karl Maton School of Education, University of Cambridge Correspondence address: 108 Avenue Road Extension, Leicester LE2 3EH Tel: 0116 220 1066 Email: karl.maton-AT-dtn.ntl.com I am certain of nothing but the holiness of the heart’s affections and the truth of the imagination Keats ********************************************************************** 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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