File spoon-archives/bourdieu.archive/bourdieu_2003/bourdieu.0305, message 118


From: "Chris Andersen" <cta1-AT-ualberta.ca>
Subject: 
Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 08:47:04 -0600


Hi Kent,

At the risk of speaking for others, I assume the earlier 'start with the
thinnest' comment was meant to indicate that it doesn't really matter
where you start, just jump in and get reading.  People read Bourdieu for
all sorts of reasons, so one would start in different places for
different purposes (obviously).  And besides, Bourdieu was a lot like
Foucault in that he was interested in how people stretched, pulled at
and ruptured his concepts, even if they used them in a way not
ultimately satisfying for him.  In other words, there isn't necessarily
any 'correct' way to read him (especially for those of us who have no
interest in immanent critique).  So, how about we start with the book
with the prettiest cover?  The nicest font?    

Incidentally, for someone who dabbles in Bourdieu (rather than
possessing a comprehensive knowledge) I really want to commend those of
you writing in on the list.  Personally, I find most of Bourdieu's
writing/prose boring beyond tears.  This is (one would assume) a result
of my lack of grounding in the various philosophical traditions from
which he derives his critiques, etc. (not to mention his utter contempt
for periods).  However, some of you use his work really creatively and
it's really helped ME engage in his texts more creatively than I had to
this point.

Lastly, has anyone here read the work of Stanley Fish?  It seems to me
that there numerous similarities between his and Bourdieu's projects
(especially in a context of legal practice).  I'm thinking specifically
of Fish's "Doing what Comes Naturally: Change, Rhetoric, and the
Practice of Theory in Literary and Legal Studies".  

Cheers,
Chris

<<>><<>><<>><<>><<>><<>>
Chris Andersen
School of Native Studies
5-182 Education North
University of Alberta
Edmonton, AB, CANADA
T6G 2G5
(780) 492 4814 - phone
(780) 492 0527 - fax
www.ualberta.ca/nativestudies

 

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
[mailto:owner-bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu] On Behalf Of kent
strock
Sent: May 8, 2003 11:08 PM
To: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
Cc: sigmund5-AT-hotmail.com
Subject: start with the thinnest???

to ask a question about academic habitus? why ask what is the thinnest 
book?? why priviledge it? the most intense discussion of habitus and the

nature of academic practice, as following the "logic" all other 
practices...is in The Logic of Practice.  This logic is not that of
dominant 
scientific writing which fetishizes clarity...as does the dominant
media.  
Despite the "democratization" of readings of Bourdieu in the name of a
dated 
liberalism, there is much to be found which resists this call for 
simplification which only serves the corportization of America and the 
university and its system of cultural production.  Bourdieu's notion of 
subjectivity and the responsibility of the academic calls for something 
more. Not just the rational enlightenment of the masses, but a different

role for the academic and the method of production...both in terms of 
structure, but in method of writing.
     Bourdieu's earliest and most cogent argument concerns the continual

return to the relation to the object of study-as the basis of "progress"

makes, On Television, as a later text misguided.  The mature works are a

sumnation of a continual difficult and tortured process that is, as was 
mentioned in an earlier post, as extremely seductive as it is demanding.
A 
man struggling with the role of the academic both intellectually and 
existentially.  This is the Nietzschian Bourdieu, who took up a fight
only 
with those strong enough to warranted his time...because they raised 
questions which haunted him...most notably Heidegger.  BTW one of the
most 
intersting works on TV in general, much better than Bourdieu's, which
deals 
in part with Heidegger, but also Benjamin, Adorno, Derrida, Madonna,
David 
Lynch is Richard Dienst's "Still Life in Real Time". Its out of print 
unfortunately and published by Duke Univeristy Press.
   An alternative interpretation of the later works is a dying man
wanting 
to make a more direct and poignent effect on the world.  which is
sadder.



Life is the lie we tell everybody else.
-vic chesnutt





>From: Pam Stello <stello-AT-socrates.berkeley.edu>
>Reply-To: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>To: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>Subject: Re: a bit of everything plus a question - is habitus
reproduced 
>mimetically?
>Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 10:21:50 -0700
>
>responding again to Iva's question re: habitus, perhaps we could begin
a
>group discussion about habitus. First, what is Bourdieu's thinnest
book?
>Perhaps we could use it as a basis to discuss habitus. Is it "On
>Television"? I'm not sure where to begin with this myself though Iva's
>question seems to me to get at the heart of the question of agency in
>Bourdieu's work. Do others agree?
>
> > could anyone explain in greater detail the mechanism
> > through which a person acquires a specific habitus?
>
>Bourdieu's writes that "...practice is the product of the habitus which
is
>itself the product of the embodiment of the immanent regularities and
>tendancies of the world..." (1992: 138). As children agents come to
embody
>the structures of the social system through day-to-day practices in the
>family. These experiences become sedimented structures. "Early
experiences
>have particular weight because the habitus tends to ensure its own
>consistency...by rejecting information capable of calling into question
its
>accumulated information..." (1984: 60-61). My reading is that the
process
>through which one acquires a habitus is not a conflictual process.
Further,
>habitus is experienced unconsciously. When I read Bourdieu's work on
the
>habitus the questions that come up for me are how did the habitus as he
>describes it come about historically? Why is there seeminly no agency
in 
>his
>account? Or is there?
>
> > is it fair to say bourdieu talks of a certain kind of
> > mimesis?
>I think Bourdieu is talking about a kind of mimesis. And he does
present us
>with a
>corporeal model of knowledge. The point that interests me is Iva's
quote:
>"'What is learned by body is not something that one has...but something

>that
>one is.'" The process of acquision of the habitus Bourdieu describes as
>universal is a historical process of commoditization. I think about
this in
>relation to "genius." Though no modern identity category works in
isolation
>of all other categories, just to offer a simplified example: At the
start 
>of
>the eighteenth century genius meant talents all or most individuals
could
>have for a moment. By the end of the eighteenth century, genius was no
>longer a moment of inspiration. It became something a man could be, and
>apart from environment and history. This is a process of
commoditization. I
>think that Bourdieu's work on the habitus habitus describes a
historically
>produced, political economic phenomenon, a part of the process of
>commoditization. I would be interested to know if others agree and what
>others think about how processes of commoditization work. In Iva's
quote
>below. I think again that she is describing commoditization:
>
>in developing new pedagogies of gender and
> > race, the politicisation and contexualisation of
> > knowledge is consistently obstructed by the intense
> > individualisation typical of liberal academic
> > institutions. so whereas on an individual level the
> > histories of previously 'marginalised peoples are now
> > 'legitimate objects of study...this legitimation takes
> > place at an attitudinal, interpersonal level rather
> > than in terms of a fundamental challenge to hegemonic
> > knowledge and...> instead of changing the field, the potential
political
> > significance of new types of knowledge is disabled
> > through their entry into a pre-established field. what
> > you end up is a form of conflict resolution - before
> > the conflict.
>
>
>
>
> > could anyone explain in greater detail the mechanism
> > through which a person acquires a specific habitus?
> >
> > in pascalian meditations bourdieu criticises sartre's
> > description of a waiter 'playing at being a waiter',
> > i.e consciously adopting a role in attempt to perform
> > his job while all the time maintaining the capacity to
> > free himself of the role. he writes:
> >
> > 'This does not mean he [the waiter] has learned to be
> > the waiter by imitatimg waiters, constituted as
> > explicit models. He enters into the character of the
> > waiter not as an actor playing a part, but rather as a
> > child imitates his father and, without even needing to
> > 'pretend', adopts a way of using the mouth when
> > talking or swinging his shoulders when walking which
> > seems to him constitutive of the social being of the
> > accopmlished adult.' (Pascalian Meditations, Polity
> > Press, Cambridge: 2000, p.154)
> >
> > is it fair to say bourdieu talks of a certain kind of
> > mimesis? could anyone point me to more literature on
> > the subject, both in bourdieu and else (especially in
> > relation to frankfurt school)?
> >
> > recently there was a debate on this list about b. in
> > relation to marx: doesn't bourdieu present us with a
> > corporeal model of knowledge ('What is learned by body
> > is not something that one has...but something that one
> > is.'), which cancels both rationalist and
> > functionalist theories of action. in this sense it
> > might be wrong to say he obscures the line between the
> > 'exploiters and the exploited' but rather points to
> > the inadequacy of rationalist emancipatory attempts
> > that aim for a change in consciousness that would
> > automatically also lead to a change in practice. on
> > the other hand, this could also mean that a change in
> > the field can only be effective, if it, in a way,
> > takes hold of the body.
> >
> > for instance (and in relation to whether a change of
> > academic discourse can by itself guarantee a change in
> > the field): in developing new pedagogies of gender and
> > race, the politicisation and contexualisation of
> > knowledge is consistently obstructed by the intense
> > individualisation typical of liberal academic
> > institutions. so whereas on an individual level the
> > histories of previously 'marginalised peoples are now
> > 'legitimate objects of study...this legitimation takes
> > place at an attitudinal, interpersonal level rather
> > than in terms of a fundamental challenge to hegemonic
> > knowledge and history'(Chandra Talpade Mohanty, 'On
> > Race and Voice: Challenegs for Liberal Education in
> > the 90s' in Henry Giroux and Peter McLaren (eds),
> > Between Borders: Pedagogy and the Politics of Cultural
> > Studies, Routledge, New York: 1994, p.154; both
> > McLaren and Giroux are an excellent reference point).
> > instead of changing the field, the potential political
> > significance of new types of knowledge is disabled
> > through their entry into a pre-established field. what
> > you end up is a form of conflict resolution - before
> > the conflict.
> >
> > anyway, i really should stop here. sorry again for
> > this lengthy reply (a result of my being a sadly
> > irregular correspondent) and thank you all for your
> > input, in the past few weeks this list has been very
> > interesting to read indeed.
> >
> > take care
> >
> > iva.
> >
> > ps. why does it matter so much what bourdieu's book
> > you read first? i don't get the impression he was big
> > on beginning and middle and end. start with the thinnest?
> >
> > __________________________________________________
> > Yahoo! Plus
> > For a better Internet experience
> > http://www.yahoo.co.uk/btoffer
> >
**********************************************************************
> > Contributions: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
> > Commands: majordomo-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
> > Requests: bourdieu-approval-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
> >
>
>**********************************************************************
>Contributions: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>Commands: majordomo-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>Requests: bourdieu-approval-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu

_________________________________________________________________
The new MSN 8: smart spam protection and 2 months FREE*  
http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail

**********************************************************************
Contributions: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
Commands: majordomo-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
Requests: bourdieu-approval-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu


**********************************************************************
Contributions: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
Commands: majordomo-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
Requests: bourdieu-approval-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu

   

Driftline Main Page

 

Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005