SubStance

SubStance 29.3 (2000) 84-102

Pierre Bourdieu and Literature

Jacques Dubois

to Constanze Baethge

Bourdieu's thought is disturbing. Provocative. Scandalous even, at least for those who do not easily tolerate the unmitigated truth about the social. Nonetheless his ideas, among the most important and innovative of our time, are here to stay. This thought has taken form in the course of a career and through works on diverse subjects that have constructed a far-reaching analytical model of social life, which the author calls more readily an anthropology rather than a sociology. In their totality, they constitute today an original and powerful proposal to explain human practices.

In the face of criticisms commonly leveled at Bourdieu's thought (notably the charge that it reduces everything to a single schematic model), it is important to identify the spirit of his enterprise. Early on, it is true, his thought drew on a few fundamental concepts--the trilogy habitus, field (champ), practice (pratique)--to which it constantly returned, and followed a clearly defined trajectory. At the same time, however, he continually reformulated, adapted, and refined his analytical model, depending on the operations to which he subjected new objects of inquiry. The regenerative and transformative force of his thought was supported by two convictions. First, that there being nothing more vain than theory for theory's sake, it is preferable that theoretical production originate in the study of concrete and occasionally very specific cases. Second, that in order to escape stereotypical classifications, boundaries separating disciplines are best transgressed, thereby favoring new constructions of the object of inquiry.

Thus oriented, Bourdieu's thought has never failed to be inventive and audacious, subjecting the most solidly anchored ideas to change. It undeniably owes much to earlier theories, but it always remelds borrowed material into an original model. One example is the concept of class relations undoubtedly inherited from Marxism. Other than the fact that he redefines the very notion of class, Bourdieu reinscribes these relations within a very different framework where the symbolic--the superstructure?--can greatly supersede the economic. In addition, the result is a powerful investigative tool, as demonstrated by its applicability to the most diverse subjects, from [End Page 84] education to the arts, from language to politics, from literature to relations between the sexes, and by its challenge to our understanding of them as well. In every instance (even if from one subject to another, the model's output may seem unequal) the analysis leads to a profound reformulation of the domain under investigation.

The coherence and radicalness of Bourdieu's thought are made more apparent by its "deterministic" bent, which is its hallmark. The social agent, according to Bourdieu, is defined through a process of inculcation, which, derived from his primary relationship, imposes a series of constraints on his actions. However, this dependency is constantly refuted by the social discourse, and this gives the agent the illusion of being autonomous, of being the master of his decisions and preferences. Bourdieu's primary intention is to expose this illusion, dismantle its founding mechanism, and subvert the surrounding beliefs it creates. This is what makes this enterprise intolerable to the devotees of obedience. On the other hand, those who do not fear exposing the impostures that govern us can only find this work of discovery beneficial and stimulating. In fact, by its very ambivalence, this process recalls what Proust accomplishes in A la recherche du temps perdu. For Proust also, it is a matter of a lifetime of deconstructing beliefs, but in such a way that those who engage in the process become ultimately enchanted by their own disenchantment. By shedding one's illusions, one reaches a truth: the critical mastery over life. Moreover, if, for Bourdieu, the position of the social agent in the world is prescribed, considered as that which allows the individual to draw the proper conclusions, the practice, or "experience of the game" does not prevent him from discovering an entire space in which to invest his freedom. Artistic creation, in particular, attests...