From: Simon Beesley <simonb-AT-beesleys.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Quest.
Date: Mon, 30 Apr 2001 20:05:58 +0100


Irvin,

You wrote:

> Simon's comment leads me to comment on my perception of a territorializing
> instinct in some posts.  It's sort of like--I and my group of like-thinkers
> have the "right" picture of bourdieu.

This would be a point worth making only if there were any other way of discussing ideas --
arguing for and against positions, finding grounds for them, putting forward reasons for
believing this or that, or disbelieving it, etc. You seem to be gesturing to a chimerical
notion of intellectual correctness where no-one claims to believe strongly in any position
whatsoever lest they be charged with a territorial instinct. It doesn't matter one jot
whether the tone of one's contribution suggests the belief that one is right or has the
right picture. I certainly believe that my picture of Bourdieu -- as far as it goes -- is
"right" but my belief is only as good as the considerations and arguments I put forward
for it. There is no other way to proceed -- unless, that is, you endorse some sort of
free-floating, free-wheeling, formless relativism. As Hillary Putnam puts it "If any
point of view is as good as any other, then why isn't the point of view that relativism is
false as good as any other?" To insist that there is a right picture of Bourdieu -- or,
simply, that some interpretations and understandings of Bourdieu are more correct than
others -- is not necessarily to be dogmatic, territorialistic, totalitarian, totalizing or
what-have-you. It is instead the most fundamental prerequisite for discourse about ideas.

> I say
> all this in challenge to the notion that we need to understand such and
> such and such and such in order to read someone like bourdieu.  Against
> this territorializing notion, I would ask--how would b. interpret that
> move?

The question of what concepts, theories, and bodies of knowledge will facilitate
understanding of Bourdieu's (not notably accessible) ideas is quite a different matter.
And I can't see that it is at all territorializing. For example, I have seen posts on this
list which suggest a knowledge of Raymond Boudon's sociology (and his critique of
Bourdieu) would be useful. As it happens I haven't read Boudon (and until I joined the
list hadn't heard of him). But I don't think the recommendation to read him is
territorializing or, on the other hand, that my ignorance of Boudon is a great handicap.
It's not an all or nothing thing. Very likely reading Boudon would be most illuminating.
But if I can't be bothered or haven't got the time to read him, maybe somebody who has can
tell me something about his sociology and do so on this list. Where's the intellectually
incorrect territorial notion here?

Regards
Simon
















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