Saturday, March 18, 2023

12 key concpets in Bourdieu's socological thought

Some of bourdieu's most important key concepts include:

Habitus: Bourdieu's most famous concept, habitus refers to the set of dispositions, attitudes, and behaviors that are acquired through socialization and shape an individual's actions and beliefs.

Field: Bourdieu uses the term field to describe the social spaces in which individuals and groups compete for resources, recognition, and power. Fields can be anything from the art world to the academic world to the political world.

Cultural Capital: Bourdieu identifies three types of capital: economic, cultural, and social. Economic capital refers to money and other financial resources, cultural capital refers to knowledge, skills, and education, and social capital refers to social networks and relationships.

Symbolic power: This refers to the ways in which cultural symbols, such as language and symbols, are used to legitimate and reinforce social hierarchies and power relations.

Symbolic violence: This concept describes the ways in which dominant groups use their power to impose their beliefs and values on others, even if those beliefs and values are harmful or oppressive.

Cultural production and reproduction: Bourdieu argues that the cultural practices and values of the dominant class are passed down from generation to generation, creating a cycle of cultural reproduction that perpetuates social inequality.

Doxa: Doxa refers to the unquestioned beliefs and assumptions that are accepted as common sense by members of a particular social group.

Distinction: Bourdieu argues that individuals use cultural consumption to distinguish themselves from others and to show their social status.

Cultural omnivorousness: This concept describes the tendency for people to consume a wide range of cultural products from different social fields, rather than sticking only to those that are associated with their own social group.

Practice theory: This refers to Bourdieu's approach to understanding social behavior, which emphasizes the ways in which social actors navigate and negotiate social structures and constraints through their everyday actions and practices.

Linguistic Market: refers to the ways in which language is used as a form of capital, with certain varieties of language being valued more highly than others.

Rexflixivity: the need of a resercher to be aware of his or hers own position and bias.