Rosemarie Dominguez
Soc 385
Bourdieu
Habitus and Field
Pierre Bourdieu’s take on sociology is linking subjectivism and objectivism, subjectivism being the individual and objectivism being society. Bourdieu examines the social construction of how people construct their own social world based on their perceptions, with keeping in mind how perception and construction are compelled by structures. It is the objective structures in which culture and language influences human action and their everyday routines. Habitus is a very complicated concept, but when we think of the term in a more simplistic way, habitus can be define as referring to a particular social group’s lifestyle, values, dispositions and expectations that are acquired through the activities and experiences of everyday life. Habitus helps individuals transform and embodies whom they become. Habitus is a mental structure of how individuals deal with the social world.
There are five phases of habitus. The first is transposable which means something that can be moved. The more experience you have the more routine it becomes almost as a second nature. Sine the habitus is durable, people usually learn first hand form their parents and society. The second part structured structure, meaning there is order and there is something that is constructed. The habitus itself is a structure, it is not only a part of individuals but it is also something that operates outside of them. It is inside and outside. Not only is transposable but it is shared. The rules that structure structure develop through the organization of the outside, which influences the individual. Third, habitus is a structuring structure, once it has been developed and set it continues to reproduce the very conditions that created those. Institutions then become almost impossible to be broken, because of the continuing production that was initially created. The way people are taught exemplifies this structuring structure. Individuals learn from others and then this cyclical process of violence is almost impossible to break. Fourth, the structures become practices and these practices become habituated. Lastly, is whether or not there is room for agency or change.
The habitus is field specific, so then I chose to use an example of he documentary titled, The Interrupters, which is based on how Ceasefire aids in interrupting violence from happening. The creation of Ceasefire started due to a Professor at UIC stating that violence is a disease in which young people expect to die from it. The Interrupters intervene in low-income and high-violent neighborhoods and advocate stopping the violence in Chicago communities. This idea is relevant because Pierre Bourdieu mentions how practices become habituated and become part of us. Violence in low-income communities can be genetic, that that if someone’s father had a history of violence, then that individual will also have a history of violence and their brother or their child will too have a history of violence. Again, going back to Bourdieu’s idea, this can become continuous, and in the interrupters case it is a continuous diseased lifestyle that needs to be interrupted. This example goes in depth in how habitus is analyzed by the field of violence as it relates to inner city and impoverished neighborhoods with how violence becomes a learned adaptive response. There can room for agency, however, it is difficult to allow room for change because of the fact that these youth learn violence as a coping mechanism for everyday life and so it is deep-rooted within their daily lives but also within their communities.
The field specific in the example I chose was related to economic and social factors. People take in everything from external structures, and therefore externalize their actions from things that they have internalize through everyday practices. The habitus can be a set of internalized pattern; the way society is perceived and understood. Through the example of youth in impoverished communities, it is the concern with how powerful positions can carry out on less powerful players.
Soc 385
Bourdieu
Habitus and Field
Pierre Bourdieu’s take on sociology is linking subjectivism and objectivism, subjectivism being the individual and objectivism being society. Bourdieu examines the social construction of how people construct their own social world based on their perceptions, with keeping in mind how perception and construction are compelled by structures. It is the objective structures in which culture and language influences human action and their everyday routines. Habitus is a very complicated concept, but when we think of the term in a more simplistic way, habitus can be define as referring to a particular social group’s lifestyle, values, dispositions and expectations that are acquired through the activities and experiences of everyday life. Habitus helps individuals transform and embodies whom they become. Habitus is a mental structure of how individuals deal with the social world.
There are five phases of habitus. The first is transposable which means something that can be moved. The more experience you have the more routine it becomes almost as a second nature. Sine the habitus is durable, people usually learn first hand form their parents and society. The second part structured structure, meaning there is order and there is something that is constructed. The habitus itself is a structure, it is not only a part of individuals but it is also something that operates outside of them. It is inside and outside. Not only is transposable but it is shared. The rules that structure structure develop through the organization of the outside, which influences the individual. Third, habitus is a structuring structure, once it has been developed and set it continues to reproduce the very conditions that created those. Institutions then become almost impossible to be broken, because of the continuing production that was initially created. The way people are taught exemplifies this structuring structure. Individuals learn from others and then this cyclical process of violence is almost impossible to break. Fourth, the structures become practices and these practices become habituated. Lastly, is whether or not there is room for agency or change.
The habitus is field specific, so then I chose to use an example of he documentary titled, The Interrupters, which is based on how Ceasefire aids in interrupting violence from happening. The creation of Ceasefire started due to a Professor at UIC stating that violence is a disease in which young people expect to die from it. The Interrupters intervene in low-income and high-violent neighborhoods and advocate stopping the violence in Chicago communities. This idea is relevant because Pierre Bourdieu mentions how practices become habituated and become part of us. Violence in low-income communities can be genetic, that that if someone’s father had a history of violence, then that individual will also have a history of violence and their brother or their child will too have a history of violence. Again, going back to Bourdieu’s idea, this can become continuous, and in the interrupters case it is a continuous diseased lifestyle that needs to be interrupted. This example goes in depth in how habitus is analyzed by the field of violence as it relates to inner city and impoverished neighborhoods with how violence becomes a learned adaptive response. There can room for agency, however, it is difficult to allow room for change because of the fact that these youth learn violence as a coping mechanism for everyday life and so it is deep-rooted within their daily lives but also within their communities.
The field specific in the example I chose was related to economic and social factors. People take in everything from external structures, and therefore externalize their actions from things that they have internalize through everyday practices. The habitus can be a set of internalized pattern; the way society is perceived and understood. Through the example of youth in impoverished communities, it is the concern with how powerful positions can carry out on less powerful players.