Pierre Bourdieu

`Bourdieu's work is formidable - the journey is tough. Follow this French foreign legion - take an apple, take a hanky - but take this book' - Peter Beilharz , La Trobe University `A good range of recent examples from popular culture are used to flesh out the material in accessible terms. These examples are deployed very well indeed - rather than being tacked-on illustrations of an idea, they are instead used at the heart of the explanation of the ideas' - David Gauntlett, Leeds University Now considered one of the most influential thinkers of the 20th century, Pierre Bourdieu has left his mark on most of the 'big' theoretical issues in the world of contemporary theory: gender, subjectivity, the body, culture, citizenship, and globalization. His terms are now commonplace: 'social capital', 'cultural capital', 'field', and 'habitus'. Bourdieu examines how people conduct their lives in relation to one another and to major social institutions. He argues that culture and education aren't simply minor influences, but as important as economics in determining differences between groups of people. Unlike the other grand systematisers Marx and Foucault, Bourdieu has tested these arguments in detailed fieldwork. His range is eclectic, his vision is vast, and his writing is often dense and challenging. Understanding Bourdieu offers a comprehensive introduction to Bourdieu's work. It is essential reading for anyone tackling him for the first time.

This book offers a new account of what makes science special among other human pursuits, critically engaging with a variety of approaches, especially constructivist and relativist studies of science and technology. It focuses on the studied "lack of haste" of science, its relative freedom from stress and its socially sanctioned withdrawal from the swift pace of ordinary life. Unhastening Science offers a balanced and thoughtful argument which emphasizes the dangers of cosseting science from the "scourge" of internal competition while at the same time highlighting the need for "distance" between the process of scientific thought and the faster machinery of politics, business, sports, and the media.

This volume traces the origins of social capital through the work of Becker, Bourdieu and Coleman, and comprehensively reviews the literature across the social sciences.

Rothstein maintains that schools in all societies inculcate students with ideological understandings of themselves and their economic systems. Using a Freudo-Marxian approach, he explores the impact of capitalism on schooling in America and Europe and traces the formation of the individual's public and private identities. The book employs sociological, economic, and psychoanalytic perspectives to study the propagation of capitalist culture through education, and examines the way in which educational institutions reproduce the social relations of school and society. Rothstein concludes that education must be liberated from their arbitrary practices and links with the labor market.

A fully revised edition of this highly regarded concise introduction to cultural theory.

This book links such fields as linguistics, anthropology, sociolinguistics, and education to illustrate how the problem of literacy is embedded in a social and cultural context. The majority of the essays are based on original, primary research and bring to light important concerns about the highly political nature of literacy. These concerns, often ignored by the more traditionally oriented educationalists, are the highlights of these essays that explore literacy from a critical perspective.