File spoon-archives/bourdieu.archive/bourdieu_2003/bourdieu.0307, message 7


Date: Thu, 3 Jul 2003 00:13:41 -0500 (CDT)
From: =?iso-8859-1?q?nairda=20oremor?= <oxanairda-AT-yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [BOU:] Date: Wed, 2 Jul 2003 20:54:54 -0600


As i understand it. Episteme remains to the dominant paradigm of an epoch, it is linked to the enunciation of history, so it works as a restrospectivity of its discourse. Episteme is a sediment of knoweldge.
A champ or a field is more dynamic, remains to the logical function of the social practices, and it is produced by the trasformation of the social structures. A champ is what is set as the rules of a game that is ment to be executed in the field and by the field. A Field is gathered history that works through the body, but it is not a sediment, it is what make coherent the sense of practice (or the practical sense) that constitutes the social agency.
 
adr    

Chris Andersen <cta1-AT-ualberta.ca> wrote:
Hi Guys,

I have a quick question. To what extent do you think Foucault's notion
of 'episteme' squares with Bourdieu's concept of a field? For Foucault,
an episteme governs what is said and not said, what makes sense and what
is nonsense. Fields seems to structure reality in similar ways
(especially between notions of doxa, heterodoxy and orthodoxy). 

Any thoughts?



<<>><<>><<>><<>><<>><<>>
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 George
Free
Sent: July 2, 2003 8:21 PM
To: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
Subject: Re: [BOU:] On Sewell's Critique of Bourdieu in "A Theory of
Structure: Duality, Agency, and Transformation"


You could look at Bourdieu's "The Rules of Art" for an analysis of
Flaubert and the genesis of the literary field. This is an example of
social transformation and it might be possible to derive some aspects of
a theory of social change from it...

George

On Mon, 30 Jun 2003 15:37:09 +0200
Bryan Atinsky 
wrote:

> I have a question about the place of 'agency' in Bourdieu's works, and
> especially in regard to the critique of Bourdieu in Sewell, William H.
Jr.
> 1992 A Theory of Structure: Duality, Agency, and Transformation.
American
> Journal of Sociology 98(1):1-29.
> 
> I am no expert on Bourdieu, but after having done a pretty thorough
reading
> of "The Logic of Practice", "Distinction", a partial reading of "Homo
> Academicus", "Practical Reason", plus other works and articles,
including
> his interview with Terry Eagleton in Zizek's "Mapping Ideology" called
"Doxa
> and the Common Life," though I find so much of Bourdieu's work
indespensible
> to undertstanding the processes, structures and 'generative schemes'
that
> create social spaces, spatiality and temporality, identity, class,
etc., I
> also find his work frustrating in its lack of a place for agency
internal to
> the habitus, capital, field equation.
> 
> When I recently read Sewell's article (from 1992), I couldn't help but
agree
> with his critique of Bourdieu in this regard. For instance:
> 
> "Bourdieu's habitus retains percisely the agent-proof quality that the
> concept of the duality of structure is supposed to overcome. In
Bourdieu's
> habitus, schemas and resources so powerfully reproduce one another
that even
> the most cunning or improvisational actions undertaken by agents
necessarily
> reproduce the structure....Although Bourdieu avoids either a
traditional
> French structuralist ideal determinism or a traditional Marxist
material
> determinism, he does so only by erecting a combined determinism that
makes
> significant social transformations seem impossible. But is this
powerful
> implication of stasis really warranted? After all, the Kabyle society
in
> which Bourdieu carried out his fieldwork produced a momentous
anticolonial
> revolution shortly after Bourdieu returned to France to analyze his
data."
> (Sewell: 1992; 15)
> 
> In the interview with Terry Eagleton: "Even in the most economistic
> traditioni that we know, namely Marxism, I think the capacity for
> resistance, as a capacity of consciousness, was overestimated. I fear
that
> what I have to say is shockingfor the self-confidence of
intellectuals,
> especially for the more generous, left-wing intellectuals. I am seen
as
> pessimistic, as discouraging the people, and so on. But I think it is
> better to know the truth; and the fact is that when we see with our
own eyes
> people living in poor conditions...it is clear that they are prepared
to
> accept much more than we would have believed...It doesn't mean that
the
> dominated individuals tolerate everything; but they assent to much
more than
> we believe and much more than they know. It is a formidable
mechanism, like
> the imperial system -- a wonderful instrument of ideology, much bigger
and
> more powerful than television or propaganda. That is the main
experience I
> want to convey. What you say about the capacity for dissent is very
> important; this indeed exists, but not where we look for it -- it
takes
> another form." (Bourdieu in Zizek: 1994; 268-269).
> 
> Now, I think what he says here is important and needs to be taken
into
> consideration, and he does allude to the capacity for dissent, but it
seems
> to me that the answer is always external to his statements. It always
> remains a generalized and elusive notion in his works (as far as I
have
> seen).
> 
> So what I want is for you to tell me that I am wrong.
> 
> Bourdieu's approach/theory is such a great tool, I would hope to be
able to
> use it also for an understanding of the ways in which agency functions
as a
> transformative element in the complex of social practices.
> 
> 
> Thank you,
> 
> Bryan
> 
> 
> 
> 
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