Bourdieu – the sequel with DW discussionsThursday 18th September 2014

• Video…

Bourdieu: Essential Concepts1. ‘Structuralist constructivism’, an attempt to

transcend dualisms of agency v. structure, objective v. subjective and micro v. macro.

2. Field – a social space in which individuals confront each other in conflict and competition; social space can also be called ‘a field of social classes’

3. Capital – ‘useable resources and powers’ (1984), material/non-material resources that confer social power (4 types); follows a definite distribution.

4. Social positions – all the possible places one could occupy in a particular field

5. Social Space – a space of relative social positions, organized by the distribution of capital in a field, relational – tastes and practices are organized by actors’ positions relative to each other in a social field

6. Practices – the process of signaling your position through the use of symbols (dress, style, manner of speech, beverage choice, political views etc)

7. Dispositions - a ‘natural’ tendency to act in a specified way, preferences for action, neither conscious or completely unconscious, neither rational action nor pre-determined

8. Habitus – systems of dispositions that are shaped by an actor’s experience in her position, and are enacted through practices

9. Game – a metaphor for “doing” social life, learning the ‘rules of the game’, developing a “feel for the game”, mentally and physically, and therefore able to anticipate how to improvise based on past experience.

Bourdieu’s classification of capitals

1. Economic Capital – access to income,

wealth or property; physical assets, that

produce profits and persist; can be

simply bestowed or transferred

2. Cultural Capital – prestige

associated with specialized

knowledge, not tangible; ability to

interpret institutional requirements

(or the rules of the game) that

allow people to succeed or achieve a

higher status in society; spoke of

high or legitimate culture,

middlebrow, and popular culture

3. Social Capital – connections to

others and benefits conferred;

obligations and networks of trust

based on group membership;

advantages lead to success.

4. Symbolic Capital – ability of actors

to use practices to defend or

maintain their positions; to show

their positions to be desirable, so

that others come to perceive or

recognise their positions as

legitimate.

Symbolic capital1. Individuals perceive one another primarily through the

“status” which attaches to their practices2. They misperceive the real basis of these practices:

the economic and cultural capital that underlies the different habitus and therefore leads to the practice

3. These misperceptions of honour function as ‘symbolic capital’ (Bourdieu 1991, p. 238).

4. “[T]he very lifestyle of the holders of power contributes to the power that makes it possible, because its true conditions of possibility remain unrecognized” (Bourdieu, 1990a, p. 139).

5. This misperception of social space—which characterizes both the dominant and the dominated, albeit to the advantage of the latter—is also “symbolic violence.”

Symbolic violence (recap)

1. Symbolic violence as ‘violence which is exercised upon a social agent with his or her complicity’ (Bourdieu and Wacquant (2004, p. 272).

2. Symbolic violence as the process of internalising identity-based oppressions associated with poverty and repressive regimes.

3. Subjects in this model are aware and ‘knowing agents’ who, ‘even when subjected to determinisms’, have a role in structuring those outcomes (ibid.).

4. Symbolic violence ‘works’ through the perception of the internal coherence of differential privilege

Bourdieu’s theory of capitals

1. Key in locating people in social space2. Result in social reproduction3. Understanding capitals allows for the disruption

of privilege, and transformation of power4. “Every type of capital is reducible in the last

analysis to economic capital” (Bourdieu, 1977/ 1997, p. 54).

5.  Unequal distribution of capital – in all its forms – explain why societies are structurally stratified and not merely dependent on “simple games of chance… so that everything is not equally possible” (Bourdieu, 1977/ 1997, p. 46) for all members.

Capitals and the reproduction of class through education. 1. Social and cultural capital is

accumulated over time and “cannot be transmitted instantaneously . . . by gift or bequest, purchase or exchange” (Bourdieu, 1977/1997, p. 48), but by “presuppos[ing] a specific labor, i.e. an apparently gratuitous expenditure of time, attention, care, concern” (ibid, p. 54).

2. Cultural and social capital linked to the possession of economic capital – which in turn buys useable time – which can then be used to transfer networks and institutional knowledge, e.g. Mothers’ or teachers’ time.

3. Families who already have economic capital are therefore more able to purchase this usable time.

Bourdieu’s understanding of class1. Said “[s]ocial classes do not

exist”; rather, “[w]hat exists is a social space, a space of differences”

2. Neither real nor socially constructed

3. Not as relation to means of production (Marx) but as volume of ‘capital’

4. Divided into dominant class, petty bourgeoisie and working class

5. Three components – volume of capital, composition of capital, and trajectory in social space

6. Studied the first two empirically in ‘Distinction’

7. Used ‘occupation’ (lifestyle, status) as indicator of position in social space

8. Concluded that people from same occupations, shared perceptions of importance of various goods and practices – due to ‘habitus’

9. Used ‘consumption’ (art, music, food, fashion) to analyse difference

10.Social spaces, more important in understanding domination than gender or racial distinctions, for example.

11.Argued people’s actions can be explained not only the structures that they are living in as objective reality enforcing its inescapable will, but by their habitus.

Food, presentation, culture

+

Social space: Positions, Practices, and the Distribution of Capital

Total Capital +

Total Capital -

Cultural Capital + Cultural Capital -

Economic Capital - Economic Capital +

Bourdieu!

Thinking about DW in context• NDP video

Returning to domestic work…• Ronelle Burger, Marisa Coetzee & Carina van der Watt produced a working paper for the University of Stellenbosch, Economics Department titled: Estimating the benefits of linking ties in a deeply divided society: considering the relationship between domestic workers and their employers in South Africa.

• Examine whether close ties between employers and domestic workers have a good impact on ‘socio-economic mobility’ for DW and their families…

Burger et al• They argue DW households “appear to have lower unemployment duration and better quality jobs”

• “a higher likelihood of owning assets”• “a lower prevalence of child and adult hunger”

Discussion? • How does domestic work perpetuate particular social stratifications of race, class & gender if you’re using a Bourdieu lens – • Habitus• Capitals (particularly how symbolic capital hides forms of inequality / perpetuates symbolic violence?)

• Fields (the domestic sphere? Reproductive labour?

• Issues of power felt differently in different spheres for employer & employee

• Doxa?

Resistance…• To start this journey of resistance, one man’s take on paying a living wage to his domestic worker

• http://transforming.org.za/2013/06/11/how-we-came-to-pay-a-living-wage/

• Nigel Branken – spiritual transformation ‘living on the edge’

Branken• I searched through the Scriptures, looking in the concordance for words like wage, labour, work, worker, employer and exploitation. What I discovered was eye opening and left me deeply convicted. Throughout Scripture, the onus for setting wages is the responsibility of the employer and Scripture repeatedly warns against those who exploit workers. One Scripture which stood out to me was Isaiah 58. The context for this text is set in verse 3, which says “you live with your pleasures while you exploit your workers”. The text then goes on to talk about five areas:

1) Food (“feed the hungry”); 2) Shelter (“provide the poor wanderer with

shelter”); 3) Clothing (“clothe the naked”); 4) Basic needs (“satisfy the needs of the

oppressed”); and 5) Things that will break the cycle of

poverty (“untie the cords of the yoke”).

“As I looked at these five areas, I realised that unless the wages that I paid were providing for all five of these areas, I was exploiting my worker. I realised that I had been setting wages based on norms of what others paid and not on what was right. I realised that the minimum wage to be paid should not be less than what is required to live. As I reflected on this, I recalled many times asking myself the question “How does she live on this?”, but never truly seeking an answer to that question. This led me to the damning conclusion that I had been exploiting my domestic worker. “

As I looked at the “pleasures” in my budget that I could do away with in order to ensure that I could pay a living wage to my domestic worker, I quickly found a few areas where I could make a change. There were so many things in my life that I had prioritised over ensuring that she was paid a living wage. I found that by sacrificing a few non-essential items, I was able to pay her justly.

For those who earn under R 5000 per month per family, this life expectancy is significantly reduced. In essence, this means when I pay a wage below a living wage, I am reducing the life expectancy of that person perhaps by as much as 20 years. In the back of my head is the question, “How is this different to murder?”

I have also realised that most of my wealth, privilege, and opportunities have been provided to me because of the structural inequalities which exist and have existed for a long time within society.

Resistance• What are other forms of resistance in this space / field / relationship?

Some resistance frameworks• Heldke & O’Conner’s framework• Holander & Einwohner’s understanding• Starting to think about resistances…

Heldke & O’Connor• Lisa Heldke – Professor in Philosophy and Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies at Gustavus Adolphus College

• Areas of expertise – American philosophy, feminist philosophy, philosophy of food, and Race Theory

• https://gustavus.edu/profiles/heldke

Heldke & O’Connor• Peg O’Connor – Professor in Philosophy and Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies at Gustavus Adolphus College

• Areas of expertise – Feminist Philosophy, Moral Philosophy, Wittgenstein and Addiction

• https://gustavus.edu/profiles/poconnor

Heldke & O’Connor• aaa This anthology is based

on a distinct theoretical framework that provides coherence and cohesion to the readings included, presenting the phenomena of racism, sexism, heterosexism, and classism as interlocking systems of oppression. Resting upon this oppression model are two sets of theories, one concerned with the phenomenon of privilege--the companion of oppression--and the other with resistance--the response to oppression.

Heldke & O’Connor• Philosophy based, US college course syllabus

• Oppression & Privilege interlocking and complex systems, require complex responses (Angela Davis says this too)

• Therefore resistances can take many forms which can be in tension with each other

Heldke & O’Connor1. Education – starting with schools,

informal educationa) ‘antiracism, multiculturalism and

interracial communityb) ‘Why We Read: Canon to the Right of Me…c) Face-to-face, day-today-Racism CRd) Anti-Sexist Consciousness raising groups

for mene) Dangers with Men’s Consciousness-raising

groups

Heldke & O’Connor2. Treason, traitorousness, disloyalty to

systems of oppression and privilege (including using humour and anger)a) Treason to Whiteness is Loyalty to

Humanityb) Indian Humour

Heldke & O’Connor3. Separatism and identity politics – not

‘bowing out’ but “an active strategy that creates communities intentionally organized around principles or identitiesa) Black Power: A Scientific Concept Whose

Time Has Comeb) Lesbianism: An act of resistancec) A Black Feminist Statementd) Willfil Virgin or Do you Have to Be a

Lesbian to be a Feminist

Heldke & O’Connor4. Revolution – not the ones that replace

old oppressors with new ones, one that changes the whole oppressive systema) Toward a Constructive Definition of Black

Powerb) Revolution: Its not neat or pretty or

quickc) Feminist Revolution: Development through

struggled) Toward the new Frontiers of Fairy Vision

Heldke & O’Connor5. Coalition building – systems of

oppression & resistance make us enemies, what happens when we unite along shared need or common enemy? a) Breaking a Cycleb) Beyond Racial Identity Politics: Toward a

Liberation Theory for Multicultural Democracy

c) Standing beside my sister, Facing the enemy