Books & ideas

Bourdieu by Bourdieu

Jacques Hamel — 2024-02-27T12:43:33Z

Pierre Bourdieu declared that sociology has the power to reflect on itself, and in particular to reflect on its own scientificity. Four rare or previously unpublished texts serve to illustrate this doctrine, the implications of which are still open to debate.

Is Bourdieu's Theory Too Deterministic?

Bridget Fowler — 2018-09-20T08:33:00Z

Marc Joly's book engages a vigorous debate with Jean-Louis Fabiani's critical reading of Bourdieu's theoretical legacy. Both authors seem to disagree on the precise boundaries of Bourdieu's determinism and the space he leaves to liberty, resistance and reflexivity.

The Elite Paradigm

Jan Pakulski — 2017-10-12T07:00:00Z

Influenced by Weber, Marx and Bourdieu, Milner undertakes, in his latest book, to revamp a general model of elites and nonelites. Adopting a historical approach, he defines the contours of power relations in three very distinct civilisations in an attempt to provide an updated analytical framework.

Bourdieu, a Lecture on the Method

Thibault Le Texier — 2016-07-11T07:00:00Z

The first two years of Bourdieu's teaching at the Collège de France were less a general introduction to his concepts than a long immersion in his method, at the intersection of reflexivity, symbolics and structural analysis.

Class and Culture

Nicolas Duvoux & Igor Martinache — 2015-12-10T08:00:00Z

Thirty years ago, Pierre Bourdieu's La Distinction laid the groundwork for a reintegration of cultural factors into our thinking about capital. Is this argument still valid today? Philippe Coulangeon talks about the metamorphoses of distinction in a world defined by inequalities in wealth and by the mutations of cultural legitimacy.

Bourdieu the Heresiarch

Philippe Saunier — 2015-09-28T07:00:00Z

To understand the symbolic revolution Manet launched, it is necessary to break with traditional representations of art history. This requires an intellectual revolution in its own right. Thus behind Manet, there lurks another heresiarch: Bourdieu himself.

Geopolitics of Translation

Lucie Campos — 2015-03-27T06:00:00Z

As publishing markets become increasingly international, sociology looks at the translation of work in the social sciences and humanities. Gisèle Sapiro shows the effects that the crossover between the academic and publishing spheres has on translation practices.

Does Cultural Capital Still Classify Us?

Igor Martinache — 2015-02-16T06:30:00Z

A new essay collection considers the relevance and stakes of a contemporary re-reading of Pierre Bourdieu's book Distinction, which was first published in 1979. The result is a critical discussion that is particularly vibrant, as much in terms of the positions the authors take vis-à-vis Bourdieu, as in terms of the themes and origins of the scholars who appropriate his arguments.

The Empirical Sociology of Critique

Nicolas Duvoux — 2012-02-14T20:33:08Z

Sociologist Luc Boltanski situates his most recent publications and their main concepts within his broader intellectual trajectory, examining critical sociology and the sociology of critique, and what they can tell us about today's social situation.