File spoon-archives/bourdieu.archive/bourdieu_2004/bourdieu.0402, message 20


From: "Chris Andersen" <cta1-AT-ualberta.ca>
Subject: RE: [BOU:] Fields can't be erased, only deserted
Date: Thu, 19 Feb 2004 08:53:59 -0500


Hi Cam,

It's an interesting point that you make. I think the issue is that I am
stuck on the fact that the juridical field (Bourdieu's words) as
practiced (in) today by lawyers, judges, expert witnesses, etc. is a far
cry from what might have passed for an analogous field in an indigenous
context say, three hundred years ago.  In other words, the types of
embodied understandings / practices engaged in by indigenous lawyers in
the Canadian courts today doesn't in any sense qualify them to practice
in 'indigenous law', nor would the 'universalizing attitude' and a
belief in truth and justice (a hallmark of legal actors today) have fit
into an indigenous context.  Moreover, what counts as juridical capital
(i.e. the actual substance of law) and symbolic capital (i.e. the idea
that law is arrived at through reason and logic rather than the power
relations between actors) is precisely what is supposed to set codified
law apart from indigenous 'customs'.  

So, in arguing that the courts lack jurisdiction in a particular area is
in fact to reject the juridical field's legitimacy (or perhaps, as
you've put it, Cam, reject it as practiced in its present form by the
Canadian state).  But ultimately, if fields are analytical spaces rather
than 'real' ones, and are predicated on logics and procedures
irreducible to those of other fields, at what point do we begin to argue
that a field loses its force and effect?  That is to say, if fields are
ontological guesses on our part and not 'really real', at what point do
the differences between 'western' and 'non-western' (pardon the
simplification) notions of the juridical simply cease permitting
comparison?  If you can imagine, three hundred years ago, what counted
as rules, authority, reason, rights, responsibility, etc., would have
differed radically between an indigenous nation and, say, Britain or
France (two use to examples of legal regimes used in Canada).  That is
to say, the stakes, the illusio, the rules, the boundaries, etc.; all of
these differed radically and were perceived as such by their actors.  As
researchers we might see analogous similarities in suggesting that they
all appealed to rules, authority, etc., but surely those operating
within them would not confuse one for the other.  And if the stakes, the
illusio of the participants, what counts as playing the game, etc. are
so radically different, if the history accumulated in them so different,
why link them together under the same field?

My discussion is somewhat meandering, here, but I find that each time I
write it out it gets clearer in my head (if not in the text ;) )

Chris

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-bourdieu-AT-lists.village.Virginia.EDU
[mailto:owner-bourdieu-AT-lists.village.Virginia.EDU] On Behalf Of Cameron
Mann (by way of Cameron Mann <csmann-AT-bigpond.com>)
Sent: February 19, 2004 4:24 AM
To: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.Virginia.EDU
Subject: [BOU:] Fields can't be erased, only deserted

(reposted... it hasn't appeared after 24+ hours... apologies if it comes
twice)


Chris wrote/asked:

"What i'm having a little trouble with is this: if participation in a
field
requires buying into its legitimacy (i.e. the basis for producing
symbolic
capital), how does one enter into a field and yet not take on it's doxa?
Wait, let me rephrase: i think it's possible to use a field and be in a
field
without buying into its legitimacy (i.e. indigenous lawyers do it all
the
time), but i can't tell if Bourdieu fails to deal with this issue and
thus is
a weakness of his theory, or if I've just missed or misinterpreted where
he
deals with it. Ultimately i guess, my question is this: can the struggle
over
capital ever involve attempting to overthrow the entire field rather
than
(say) radically change it?"

Chris, I have to guess the indigenous lawyers (allegedly) participate in

the (Canadian?) legal system "without buying into it's legitimacy" by 
arguing that the established courts/laws do not have the jurisdiction,
or 
rights or authority to exert their influence on certain people or
places. 
But saying the courts and laws are not legitimate is a long way from 
rejecting the legitimacy of the legal field.

To prescribe and proscribe practices from certain people, times or
places 
is to take a stance on the rule of law, and to thus be a part of a legal

field. It is not saying that there are not and can not be rules (with 
sanctions). Indeed, since each agent needs to answer 'What should I do 
now?', ethics goes wherever people go, and I find it difficult to
imagine 
how every move to the 'communal ethics' of laws and rules could be 
resisted. If that were achieved, then this state of lawlessness would
still 
be a stance in the legal field (perhaps, that only the conscience or 
after-world has the authority to determine proper behaviours that have
at 
other times been determined by rules/laws [ie, the law of lawlessness]).

I can see the indigenes to the left of me, and the 
courts/lawyers/universities to the right, both groups screaming "You're
not 
legitimate"  at each other.  I can't imagine them trying to prove their 
cases in any other way that with appeals to reason, rights, authority, 
repsonibilities, truth and justice, and can't imagine these arguments
being 
anything other than part of a legal field. A legitimate part of the
legal 
field could only be delegitimised from a position (however novel or 
unconsecrated) within the legal field.

I think that it is NOT possible to use a field and be in it without
buying 
into its legitimacy. And thus, it is not possible for indigenous lawyers
to 
do it all the time.

Par was making the point that the 'capital' about which a field is 
established is an object of struggle. Exactly what it is, exactly what
its 
for, exactly who's got it, exactly who needs it, etc all subject to 
struggles within the field.

To overthrow the entire field is to say that the capital is nothing, has
no 
function or purpose, is possessed by no one, is not needed etc. You
can't 
just "pop" a field out of existence by arguing that it isn't there -
that 
very discussion would keep it there. The nearest a field would get to
being 
overthrown is to have everybody leave it, and thus prove (in practice)
that 
the field is pointless.

Even this would rarely (never?) be a complete success however. There's 
still likely to be someone somewhere with a conscious interest in the 
field. The field itself would have left its marks on the world in some
way 
(institutionalised history: a book, a procedure, some words etc) and on 
some agents (embodied history: some questions, some perceptions etc).

Where did all the fields and their capital go during the Dark Ages when 
everything was forgotten? Where did they all come back from when reborn
in 
the Renaissance? (apologies for my Eurocentric indoctrination).

Cam
--------------------
csmann-AT-bigpond.com

"what you do for now, will it do for now?" - SFK
                                                                       

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