Pierre Bourdieu on Structure Agency Structuralism

Geographical Approaches Prof. H. Ernste Academic Year: 2006/2007 Radboud University of Nijmegen 19th of December 2006

Davide Pignone 0644986 Roel Winkels 0624527

Content

Preface.................................................................................................3 1.1 General introduction on Bourdieu ............................................4 1.2 Bourdieu in context to other sociologists ................................4 1.3 Bourdieus structuralism: Structuralism Constructivist.5 1.4 Methodology by Bourdieu..........................................................6 1.5 Theory of distinction (Praxis) ...................................................7 1.6 Bourdieus importance to human geography ..........................9 1.7 Conclusions ..............................................................................10

Preface
This term paper presents our work about Pierre Bourdieu and his vision on structure, agency and structuralism.

The first paragraph contains a general introduction on Bourdieu.

The second paragraph will outline Bourdieu in context to the other sociologists: people who have influenced him.

In the third paragraph structuralism is adopted in a new tradition of Bourdieu; Bourdieus structuralism: Structuralist Constructivism. It is useful to see how Bourdieu categorises himself in the sociologists framework and also how the build-up of his theory is done.

The methodology used by Bourdieu to know how he works and thinks will be discussed in paragraph 4.

In paragraph 5 the focus is on the theory itself: the theory on habitus, field and capital dealing with structure and agency.

In paragraph 6 the importance of Bourdieu and his work in the human geography will be stressed.

In the last paragraph some conclusions will be made on Bourdieus way of working and his vision on structure, agency and structuralism.

1.1 General introduction on Bourdieu Pierre Bourdieu was a famous French sociologist born in 1930 in Denguin, a village in the rural Bearn region in the south of France. In the early 1950s he studied philosophy at the cole Normale Suprieure in Paris, an elite teacher training institute. In 1956 he had to fulfil his duty in the French army in Algeria. This period in which he did a lot of ethnographic research on the Berber people marks the start of his career as an originally philosopher moving to a social scientist. In 1964 Bourdieu becomes Director of Studies at the cole Pratique des Hautes tudes. Bourdieu is appointed in 1981 to the Chair of Sociology at the College de France 1 . The works of Bourdieu contain wide-ranging disciplines: starting from a philosophic point of view to anthropology and the social sciences. Bourdieu is known for his combination of elaborated empirical research with theory 2 . Pierre Bourdieus most famous work La Distinction handles the theory on habitus, field and capital. It is named by the International Sociological Association as one of the 20th century's 10 most important works of sociology 3 . Pierre Bourdieu died in 2002 on the illness of cancer.

1.2 Bourdieu in context to other sociologists In the sixties and seventies of the 20th century sociological theory was in a crisis. Until that time sociological theorists thought in two separate ways: 1) Theories on a societal level and the relationships within (structure), and 2) Theories on a level of acting individuals (agency). Bourdieu tried to transcend this problem with a middle ground theory. It tries to overcome the absurd opposition between individual (=subjectivism) and society (=objectivism) . To do so, he used the terms habitus and field, the core elements of his theory (it will be discussed in paragraph 1.5). The triggering elements to which Bourdieu reacted on this crisis were two influential French sociologists and movements: Sartre and existentialism and Levi-Strauss and structuralism. Also the three founding fathers of sociology, Marx, Weber and Durkheim have had a great influence on Bourdieu. From Marx he derives his interest in practice. Marx wrote about structure and agency: Society doesnt consist in agents: it is a network of links and relationships in witch agents are inserted. The ideas of life-style and status, the extension of market models into fields of analysis other than the economic and the social space explained in specific fields were taken from Weber. Durkheim can be seen as the source of the social classification.
1 2

Key Sociologists Pierre Bourdieu, Richard Jenkins, 1992 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Bourdieu 3 www.kirjasto.sci.fi/bourd.htm

The last two writers we mention are: Wittgenstein and Goffman. From Wittgenstein the role of language in the constitution of the social world was important and lived experience and the interactionism of Goffman was important on Bourdieus thinking on strategising and games-playing .

1.3 Bourdieus structuralism: Structuralism Constructivist

In the preceding paragraph Bourdieu was seen in context to influential sociologists. These sociologists exemplify a sociologist movement; Bourdieu created his own: Structuralism Constructivist. This chapter contributes to the explanation of the theory of Bourdieu (mentioned in paragraph 1.5).

Sociology's goal is to clarify the meaning of actions of people to people. This thought is always present in Bourdieus sociological research 4 . Two components can be derived from this thought; the agent and the structure. In the perspective of Structuralism Constructivist there is an interplay between the agent and the structure: The social world is made of structures ((1) structuralism), objective structures of culture and language, built by agents ((2) constructivist) and when these structures are there (build) it conditions the actions of the agents 5 . In other words: 1) In the "first level objectivity" formed by material -structural - resource distribution: All kinds of capital: economic, cultural, artistic, social, symbolic, linguistic, etc. (Structuralism). 2) In the second level objectivity: mental and bodily schemes that work like a symbolic matrix of practical activities, of thoughts, of feelings, of social individual judgements. (Constructivist). The first is the structuralist level that represents the outside (structure metaphor) in which social researchers can describe the social world in its objectivity and its modification with formal models, ethnographic description, statistics tools. The strength of this point of view is the hypothesis of world transformation. Its weakness is, on one side, the risk to reinforce this structure (considering that it is an autonomous reality), on the other side it denies subjective agents by seeing them as passive holders of forces that form structures. Structuralist models reduce the vision of the world in a small and limited vision: assuming that society has his own structure. It doesnt consider that any society is also composed by human will.
4

De synthese van handelings- en systeemtheorie van de structuratietheorie van Anthony Giddens en de praxeologie van Pierre Bourdieu, licentiaatthesis, Dirk Jacobs, Universiteit Gent, 1993. 5 http://wikipedia.qwika.com/fr2en/Pierre_Bourdieu

The second is the subjectivist level, constructivist, because the social world is constantly constructed by agents with their own practices in the normal daily life. This is the social phenomenology that considers society as the product of human actions: choice, judgement, meanings attributed to the lived world of individuals. This approach alone limits itself, because the social world is not explained by the sum of individual strategies. To understand the workings of the social world according to Bourdieu a bifocal analysis is needed, a duplex look on the objective life (structure) and to the subjective life (individuals). To summarise, Bourdieu is a critical structuralist. He shares, in certain measures, the theses of structuralism, according to which there are independent structures in the social world from the individual conscience and from its will which delimit in a specific way the behaviour of the social actor. However in Bourdieus Structuralism Constructivist individuals are able to build and adapt social phenomena through their thinking and their actions, but such construction always happens inside an unavoidable structure. So in the end he leads his own position away from the path of structuralism. His criticism against structuralism doesn't lead Bourdieu to the opposite side that of voluntarism: he recognizes the conditioning (not totally conclusive) strength of social facts.

1.4 Methodology by Bourdieu The sociology of Bourdieu is characterized for the interdisciplinary of his theoretical models (between sociology, philosophy and anthropology), his heterogeneous method of research fields (literature, art, instruction, culture, religion, law, economy, science) and for the overcoming of the oppositions that are always there in social science: objective knowledge and subjective knowledge, analysis of the symbolism and the material, theory and empirical research. The language of Bourdieu is very extensive. He wanted to be precise as possible in describing social phenomena. Otherwise it would simplify the reality. In describing social phenomena he made no distinction in different disciplines (mentioned above). He refuses the partition between theory and methodology. No theory is possible without extensive research 6 . Bourdieus thinking is very complex and sometimes multi-interpretable and that is why Bourdieu is often misunderstood. This complexity originates from the fact that the human mind thinks in oppositions, for example: an object observed by a human being (meaning given by the social world) and the human being with a subjective thought about that object. His sociology tries to see both sides, overcoming the structure-agency paradigm. A sociologist is not in the position to choose, he has to rebuild the reality in his constitutive doubleness. Then it gives the relationship a sense or a context (see example above) in which we have to see it. This can be seen as
6

P.Bourdieu, Science de la science et rflexivit, Raisons dagir, Paris, 2001, pp.195-97

one of the most fundamental contributions of Bourdieu to sociology. This ambiguity however leads again, as mentioned above, to misunderstanding and it is hard to accept 7 8 .

1.5 Theory of practice The central issue in Bourdieus theory of practice, as mentioned in 1.3 Bourdieus structuralism: Structuralism Constructivist, concerns the social construction of the objective structures and the construction of the agents own social world by understanding and living within and according to these objective structures 9 . In this theory elements as habitus, field and capital play a central role. There are more elements which have a place in this theory, but the 3 mentioned are the basic elements and we emphasize our work on these basic elements. A theory of practice in itself is not novel. What is new is that he wanted to construct a theoretic model in which agents life were not taken for granted, but seen in wider patterns of the social world. In this perspective habitus, field and capital play an important role. Habitus The habitus, think of the word habit, can be defined as a system of dispositions incorporated by agents. It is a set of durable, unconscious schemes which form the foundation of someones thinking, perceiving and acting. It refers to something historical, linked to the individual history, and that it belongs to a genetic mode of thought, as opposed to an essentialist mode of thought . Backgrounds play a major role in it. On a primary level the habitus is influenced by family, parents, friends, etc. On a secondary level the habitus is influenced by education, jobs, etc. The habitus structures not only, but is also a structure itself. It gives not only direction to concrete actions (praxis), but is also an objective translation from the objective structure (structured structure) in an agent. So the habitus is influenced; an agent develops later on a habitus given in by its past (deterministic) and so an agent creates his own lifestyle 4. Field In relationship of habitus stands field as an objective compliment. The term field has different meanings / phenomena. A field is not only a definition for a certain object/space, but also a place where agents struggle for power and where agents meet each other. The social world is made up by all kind of fields. A field is a structured system of social positions occupied by agents or structures and the nature of social positions determinates the situation for them. Or in other words: fields are social spaces in which agents or structures move around 4.
7 8

Pierre Bourdieu, Volume I, Derek Robbins Pierre Bourdieu, Volume II, Derek Robbins 9 http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/007234962x/ student_view0/ chapter7/ chapter_overview.html

Capital In the fields agents use capital. There are all kinds of capital: economic, cultural, political, linguistic, etc. The relative importance of the form of capital depends from the field. Capital is used to make the position of the agent clear in its field. The agents are able by using the capital well to exercise more power and influence in a certain field. There is an interaction between habitus and field and capital is the intermediate element 4. The 3 elements attached to each other The actions of people are constituted by and constitute their dispositions (habitus), the capital they possess and the fields within which they operate 10 . In a scheme it would look like this: (Habitus * Capital) + Field = Practice
Habitus Dispositions. Principles of action and classification. Capital Economic, social, cultural, symbolic. Field-specific forms. Field Positions. Forces (relations between positions).
(This scheme was taken from a website with educational purposes)

1.6 Bourdieus importance to human geography In this paragraph we will try to make clear the contribution of Bourdieu to human geography. Bourdieu has given a great contribution to the praxis and theory of social and physical spaces. Social space represents in the works of Bourdieu the social differentiation in a society based on the provision of the social resources. As we have seen in the text above Bourdieu makes a distinction between different kinds of capital. So he makes the difference between social capital (education and knowledge) and economical capital (revenues and assets). In other words we can say that members of different classes and fractions of classes, social agents appropriate the city and make a different social use of the various physical objects. In this way these physical objects are turned into social objects full of connotations and meanings. All places, all public and private places, such as shops, bars, pubs, restaurants, houses and residential areas are all marked. All the social characteristics of inhabitants of the different residential areas are linked with perception models of those
10

www.uio.no/studier/emner/sv/iss/SGO4000/h05/undervisningsmateriale/ Struktureringsteori.ppt

areas from other people. There is a sort of double influence: first the agent influences the ambient with his way of acting and thinking (given in by the mix of social capitals in the person). Now it will grow a particular area, where it all is permeated by that particular lifestyle that, meanwhile, will influence characteristics and behavior of people who will live there. Its something like a vicious (or maybe a virtuous) circle. The different universes, composed by the localized social objects, are hierarchically arranged, internally homogeneous and destined to a unique class of agents different from the others. The physical space is like a mirror of the social space and it is structured according to the different presence of different types of capital and of their amount. It is also divided in areas: those in which you can find people with only a certain type of capital or with more of each capital and those areas in which you can find people without any kind of capital. The physical structure of the urban life may viewed as symbolic battlegrounds; territories that are fought over; a struggle going on to appropriate space 11 12 . Bourdieu has given tools of thinking to the human geography rather than a theory of geography. Terms like agent and place emphasize this. An agent bears social relationships, but also makes his own history under not self chosen conditions. Place is something what is there, but also something what is becoming.

1.7 Conclusions Pierre Bourdieu is praised for his elaborated thinking on sociology using interdisciplinary methods. By seeing social science in a broader perspective with other sciences, after all social science is constructed out of other sciences, he tried to overcome social sciences monistic vision on the social world. The dual workings of his theory is seen as original, creative and unorthodox in comparison with other sociologists. To speak in Bourdieus context people who want to read and understand the workings of his theory need to possess a considerate amount of linguistic and cultural capital. Bourdieus fashion is very complicated (because of some ontology and definition problems), even for experienced sociologists, but also because of the particular use of language. Bourdieu tried to be very specific in his way to describe his work and to lose nothing out of its context. His works are very difficult to read: long sentences, sentences in sentences, etc. He also avoided terms commonly used in sociology. Besides that he likes to play with words and sentences, for instance: The structuring structures and the structured structures. The sociology of Bourdieu is very French orientated. Other social worlds, like the American or the Dutch, do not possess these rigid lines between classes. In these social worlds human agents have more a mix of preferences derived

11 12

Bourdieu, 1999 Interview with Bourdieu by Marco DEramo

from different classes 13 . Bourdieu made a contribution to social-demographic variables. Institutions distinct from each other through the difference in lifestyles. A critique that states more than one time to Bourdieu is that the relationship between habitus and field is not clear. Sometimes we can find in his works that the field generates his own specific habitus. Meanwhile he wrote also many times that there is an interaction between the field and the habitus: its not a one way interaction. So these 2 definitions are not well defined. Agents live not only in one field, but in a network of fields and their habitus principally becomes from their background. Background is also influenced by the environment in which they grow up, that is a mix of many fields: it isnt only a creation of one field. When he says that all fields are able to create their particular habitus its like to link the fields and their own specific habitus. This is not possible, because the latter is a property of embodied, individual agents. In other languages there have been translations and interpretations of other sociologists of Bourdieus works and they accuse him of determinism. The agents in fact cant move freely through the fields; they are tied to their habitus and, so, with their origin and environment. In this immobility lies the most important criticism. While trying to overcome to structure-agency problem, Bourdieu stays rooted in objectivism. So there is no interplay. Habitus is after all a sum of influences by the social world.

13

http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Bourdieu

Bibliography Books: - The Dictionary of Human Geography by R.J. Johnston, Derek Gregory, Geraldine Pratt, Michael J. Watts After Bourdieu: influence, critique, elaboration, by David L. Swartz and Vera L. Zolberg Pierre Bourdieu, Volume I, Derek Robbins, 2000 Pierre Bourdieu, Volume II, Derek Robbins, 2000 Key Sociologists Pierre Bourdieu, Richard Jenkins, 1992 De synthese van handelings- en systeemtheorie van de structuratietheorie van Anthony Giddens en de praxeologie van Pierre Bourdieu, licentiaatthesis, Dirk Jacobs, Universiteit Gent, 1993. P.Bourdieu, Science de la science et rflexivit, Raisons dagir, Paris, 2001, pp.195-97

Websites: - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Bourdieu www.kirjasto.sci.fi/bourd.htm http://wikipedia.qwika.com/fr2en/Pierre_Bourdieu http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/007234962x/ student_ view0/ chapter7/chapter_overview.html www.uio.no/studier/emner/sv/iss/SGO4000/h05/undervisningsmaterial e/Struktureringsteori.ppt http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Bourdieu http://hyperbourdieu.jku.at