Sociology 2240E Lecture Notes - Lecture 18: Existence Precedes Essence, Pierre Bourdieu, Social Reproduction
30 Apr 2018
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Symbols, power, and the reproduction of group inequality
Monday, April 9, 2018
10:37 PM
Last week
• Mead provided us insight into how we construct meaning and mutual understanding in social life
• But: under what conditions does meaning-construction occur?
o And what about the power relations underlying these processes?
This week
• But: under what conditions does meaning-construction occur?
o And what about the power relations underlying these processes?
• Bourdieu directs us to the power relations and politics of meaning that shape the production of
culture and knowledge
• Pierre bourdieu
o Sociologist, anthropologists, philosopher
o Began his research while a conscript in the french army in Algeria
o Ends up being one of foremost public intellectuals in france
• Core theoretical influences
o Basic equation: synthesis of classical sociology and existentialism
o Durkheim: structural concern with social reproduction, analysis of symbolic structures
o Marx: concerns with capital, class domination, structural violence
o Weber: concern with social action, meaning
o Existentialism:
• Sarte: 'existence precedes essence'; in itself/for itself distinctions
• Merleau-ponty: phenomenological analysis, concern with the body and action,
dispositions
• Taken together, leads to these three questions:
o How do we explain the mechanisms of social reproduction? What role do human agents
play in this process?
o What roles does culture have in those processes of social reproduction?
o What about agency? What are the possibilities for confronting and critiquing unjust social
relations?
Point of departure
• Bourdieu key points:
o His conception of sociology reflects many of our recurring course themes and questions:
• Search for laws- the wheel of science
• How is it that x occurs -what is the meaning of this
Point of departure
• How do we explain the mechanisms of social reproduction? What role do human agents play in
this process?
o Explanations of social phenomenon need to account for both social structure and human
agency -we need to examine social relations and processes
o The question of whether a social phenomenon serves a 'purpose' is a metaphysical question,
not a scientific one
• To assume that phenomena like social inequality are 'functional' serves to implicitly
legitimize the status quo of existing power relations
• What roles does culture have in those processes of social reproduction
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o Through social research, we see the ways inequality is 'reproduced' not just through
economic, but also 'cultural' capital
o Middle-class kids are brought up to behave in different ways than working-class kids, and
are perceived to be more intelligent by their middle-class school teachers
o The unequal rewards that result lead to the perpetuation of power relations, class
distinctions, and hierarchies
• What about agency? What are the possibilities for confronting and critiquing unjust social
relations?
o Symbolic power is the power of 'world making' -the ability to have one's definition of reality
by accepted by others. We ought to struggle against the unjust exercise of this power
• Why someone says something in a debate, its important to ask, 'what are his social
reasons for saying that'
o Sociology as a martial art: the task of the sociologist is to use knowledge as a means of self-
defence against illegitimate powers, ideologies, etc.
• 3 concepts today:
o The 'habitus'
o Types of capital
o 'distinctions' and symbolic power
Social theory toolbox: the habitus
• How do we explain the mechanisms of social reproduction? What role do human agents play in
this process?
o Most useful to begin with habitus -a conceptual apparatus that links individual social actions
with social structures and history
• Appelrouth and Edle's definition:
o 'a mental filter that structures an individuals perceptions, experiences, and practices such
that the world takes on a taken-for-granted, common-sense appearance'
• I shot, it is though the haitus that oe auies a sese of oes plae i the old o a
poit of ie fo hih oe is ale to itepet oes o atios as ell as the atios of
othes CC“T: 666"
• Hence, the habitus shapes not only the mine, but the body (how people act, walk, hold themselves
etc.)
• Consider this process:
o The experience gained through processes of socialization produce a system of fairly stable
dispositions -sets of 1) principles for acting and 2) perspective son the world of possible
actions
o But: this socialization depends upon one's position in the social order
o That position leads to the taking of particular positions in relation to others in a variety of
ways
• Key points:
o The habitus entails organized, recurring orientations that a person may have toward the
world
o It is predisposed to elicit social behaviors/practices that will reproduce the same set of
orientations
• Thus, its not inevitable that they'll be reproduced -but damn likely across a whole
population)
o In other words: the habitus constitutes (and is constituted by) meanings, norms, discourses,
the orient patterns of behavior
• Thus reproducing the existing system of relations
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
