Bourdieu’s Field Theory and the Social Sciences

Highlighting the conceptual work at the heart of Pierre Bourdieu’s reflexive sociology, this cutting edge collection operationalizes Bourdieusian concepts in field analysis. Offering a unique range of explorations and reflections utilizing field analysis, the eighteen chapters by prominent Bourdieusian scholars and early career scholars synthesize key insights and challenges scholars face when going ‘beyond the fields we know’. The chapters offer examples from discipline contexts as diverse as cultural studies, poetry, welfare systems, water management, education, journalism and surfing and provide demonstrations of theorizing within practical examples of field analysis. One of the foremost social philosophers and sociologists of the twentieth century, Bourdieu is widely known in cultural studies and education and his approaches are increasingly being taken up in health, social work, anthropology, family studies, journalism, communication studies and other disciplines where an analysis of the interplay between individuals and social structures is relevant. With its unique interdisciplinary focus, this book provides a useful guide to doing field analysis and working with Bourdieusian methods research, as well as key reading for methodology courses at post-graduate level.

• Bourdieu and Field Theory
• Bourdieu and reflexive sociology
• Social Sciences and Field Theory
• Multidisciplinarity, Bourdieu and the Social Sciences
• Interdisciplinary field analysis
• Bourdieu, methodology and field analysis

• The University of Newcastle, Callaghan, Australia

  James Albright, Deborah Hartman

• University of Technology Sdyney, Sydney, Australia

  Jacqueline Widin

Dr James Albright is Professor at the School of Education, University of Newcastle, Australia. He was the inaugural director of the Educational Research Institute Newcastle (ERIN), and is the editor-in-chief of open-access journal, Education Science. His co-edited book, Pierre Bourdieu and Literacy Education (2008) addresses literacy education as a sociological field.

Dr Deborah Hartman is Associate Director of the Family Action Centre in the School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Health and Medicine at the University of Newcastle, Australia, where she specializes in teaching and research in the field of International Family Studies. Her research in Family Studies focuses on strengthening inclusivity and diversity in the study of family and on promising prevention and early-intervention practices for building family well-being and community capabilities.

Dr Jacqueline Widin is Senior Lecturer, Coordinator Applied Linguistics and TESOL Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Technology Sydney. She has extensive experience in the teaching and research field of English as an additional /international language and in the broad field of language, literacy and social justice. She is the author of Illegitimate Practices: Global English Language Education (2010).

Policies and ethics