Pierre Bourdieu (1930-2002)

training in philosophy
then move toward sociology and anthropology
fieldwork with Kabylia of Algeria
one of France's most prominent academics

practice and structure
    Marx influence - praxis
    Levi Strauss influence - structure

structure as a verb and not a noun; structure created through practice, not mechanically enacted

habitus

definitions:
"systems of durable, transposable dispositions, structured structures predisposed to function as structuring structures, that is, as principles of the generation and structuring of practices and representations which can be objectively 'regulated' and 'regular' without in any way being the product of obedience to rules" p.72

habitus and "free will"

"The habitus, the durably installed generative principle of regulated improvisations, produces practices which tend to reproduce regularities immanent in the objective conditions of the production of their generative principle, while adjusting to the demands inscribed as objective potentialities in the situation, as defined by the cognitive and motivating structures making up the habitus" p.78

"One of the fundamental effects of the orchestration of habitus is the production of a commonsense world endowed with the objectivity secured by consensus on the meaning (sens) of practices and the world, in other words that each of them receives from the expression, individual and collective (in festivals, for example), improvised or programmed (commonplaces, sayings), of similar or identical experiences. The homogeneity of habitus is what–within the limits of the group of agents possessing the schemes (of production and interpretation) implied in their production–causes practices and works to be immediately intelligible and foreseeable, and hence taken for granted" p.80

The habitus is formed and reformed through interaction with the social and material worlds.  The habitus is not equivalent to social structure and does not simply mirror social structures; its principles are internalized by individuals through the processes of socialization and they classify the world; constantly changing based on interactions with social structure.

Habitus does not govern all behavior.  In some highly regulated and codified contexts social structures are more powerful (e.g., in the realm of customary law).

Doxa (a "field"; that which is taken for granted, undiscussed, undisputed)
    orthodoxy
    heterodoxy
    doxa
    cf. "hegemony"

Types of capital:
1. economic: money, property, etc. (Marx's "productive capital")
2. cultural (cultural goods, including artistic knowledge and educational credentials)
3. social (networks of family, friends, acquaintances, and contacts)
4. symbolic (socially recognized legitimization; closely related to cultural and symbolic forms)

Marx would term cultural, social, and symbolic capital forms of "fictive capital," meaning that it is not directly economically productive (cf. economic theory's "non-productive profit seeking").

BUT, what Bourdieu masterfully shows is that cultural/social/symbolic capital (in the form of prestige, honors, etc.) is convertible back into economic capital.  For example, tuition (economic capital) is traded for academic credentials (cultural/symbolic capital) that is then converted back into economic capital on the job market.

It is perhaps the most valuable form of accumulation in certain contexts -- agricultural labor in precapitalist societies, the art world, etc..  It is a transformed and thereby disguised form of physical ''economical'' capital, produces its proper effect when it conceals the fact that it originates in ''material'' forms of capital.

Distinction
    Cultural capital:
               i. cultivated dispositions (verbal facility, aesthetic tastes, academic credentials)
               ii. material objects requiring specialized knowledge to appropriate (materially and symbolically)
               iii. institutionalized (ranking universities, for example)
buying a work of original art: economic capital + the cultural capital to appreciate it
buying a French chateau: economic capital + cultural capital of knowing how to act

intellectuals and artists, through symbolic labor, have the power to redefine the value of cultural capital
investing in cultural capital: by elites and by intellectuals and artists

music and art appreciation/tastes