ADRIAN GIO A.

LOPEZ BS ARCH 3-3

CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY RECITATION

Pierre Bourdiue

Introduction
Pierre Bourdieu was born on 1 August 1930 in a rural area of
southwestern France. The only child of a peasant sharecropper turned
postman, he left his region on the recommendation of a high school
teacher to pursue an elite academic curriculum in Paris. He graduated
from the prestigious cole Normale Suprieure, then at the apex of
French academic life. There he studied philosophy. He concentrated on
epistemology and on the history of science, which set him against the
then dominant current, existentialism, personified by Jean-Paul Sartre.
Bourdieus vocation in philosophy shifted abruptly to the social
sciences after he was drafted into the French army and sent to Algeria
at the height of its Liberation War (19561962). There he turned to
empirical inquiry, carrying out both ethnographic and statistical studies
of colonial transformation, as well as absorbing the structuralism of
Claude Lvi-Strauss. Upon his return to France, Bourdieu completed his
conversion to sociology: he became Director of Studies at the cole des
Hautes tudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris (1964); he founded a
research center (1968), launched a journal (Actes de la recherche en
sciences sociales, 1975), and assembled a research team focusing on
symbolic power, and social inequality in their broadest manifestations.
After the 1970s, Bourdieu tackled an increasingly diverse set of
empirical topics (spanning art, ritual, kinship, religion, science,
intellectuals, language, social classes, and political institutions, inter
alia) while developing his own paradigm, seeking a pathway out of the
opposition between structuralist objectivism and constructivist
subjectivismfirst proposed in Outline of a Theory of Practice. He then
honed his distinctive conceptual triad of habitus, capital, and field
in Distinction (1984) before he was elected to the Collge de France in
1982, where his research expanded to encompass the state, gender
domination, the social foundations of the economy, and the experience
of social suffering in contemporary society. Bourdieu addressed salient
social issues, as in The Weight of the World (1999), and deepened his
rethinking of the distinctive logic of practice and the epistemological
dilemmas of social inquiry in Pascalian Meditations (2000). He became
a leading public figure in the global mobilization against neoliberalism,
 while his work gained international influence across the social sciences
and the humanities. At the time of his sudden death in 2002, he was
working on a general theory of fields.

General Overviews
Over the course of his career, Bourdieu published some thirty
books and more than three hundred articles on an astounding variety
of topics, written in an empirically rich yet theoretically dense style
which can deter some readers. Amid the fast-growing literature on
Bourdieu, several texts offer routes to approach it. Wacquant
2006 provides a comprehensive and compact overview of the life and
work of the French sociologist. Brubaker 1985 is an early article
situating Bourdieu within classic social theory. Readers of French can
turn to Pinto 2002 for a more detailed presentation. Bourdieu himself
was concerned with easing entry into the thicket of his work, and he
published collections of essays based on oral presentations
(e.g., Bourdieu 1998). For social science scholars, the best entry
is Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992, which diagrams Bourdieus core
concepts, explains the inner logic of his inquiries, and responds to
objections. Another collection of public lectures and
interviews, Bourdieu 1990, offers a window into the development of his
thought and in many respects an abridged but theoretically precise
presentation of Bourdieus main research. Swartz 1998 is a highly
readable introduction to Bourdieus sociology of culture.

Emile Durkheim
Among the contemporary Sociologists Emile Durkheim, the
French genius occupies an important place. He was born in 1858 at
Epinal in France. Mostly he was a teacher of sociology in the University
of Bordeaux and Paris. He had some major works which became a
dominant force in the development of Sociology.
In fact, most of his theories were devoted to the study of social
order. His opinion was that social disorders were not the necessary
parts of the modern world and could be reduced by social reforms.
Some of the important works of Durkheims are the following.

(i) Le Suicide (The Suicide)-1897

(ii) De La Division du Travill Sociale (The Social Division of

Labour)-1893
 (iii)Les Forms Elementaries de La-yie Religiouse (The Elementary
Forms of religious life)1912

(iv) Education at Sociology (Education and Sociology)-1922.

The Suicide:

Durkheims most important reason for studying suicide was to

prove the power of the new science of Sociology. Suicide is generally
considered to be one of the most private and personal acts. Durkheim
believed that if he could show that Sociology had a role to play in
explaining such an individualistic act as suicide, it would be relatively
easy to extend Sociologys domain to phenomena.

According to Durkheim suicide is neither an individual nor a

personal act. It is a social fact. It should be studied by acquiring data
from outside of our own minds through observation and
experimentation. He was interested in explaining differences in suicide
rates but not in the study why any specific individual committed
suicide. Simultaneously he was interested in why are group had a
higher rate of suicide than another. So he assumed that only social
facts could explain it. He proceeded to give sociological classification of
suicides by showing all the principal types of suicide which are due
entirely to social causes.

According to Professor Mitchell, Durkheims classification is

primarily in terms of group attachment and group detachment.

Durkheim had explained four major forms of Suicide. They are (a)
Egoistic (b) Altruistic (c) Anomic (d) Fatalistic.

(a) Egoistic Suicide:

Durkheim believed that the best parts of human
beings like our morality, values and sense of purpose etc.
come from society. An integrated society provides us with
these things and moral support. The people who have lost
group attachment, they commit suicide because of
frustration.

Here the individual is not well integrated into the

larger unit. This lack of integration leads to a feeling that
neither the individual is part of neither society nor the
society is part of the individual. So egoistic suicide implies
that the person commits suicide when he thinks primarily
of himself when he is not integrated into the social group.
 Durkheim affirms the importance of social forces in
case of egoistic suicide also, where the individual might be
thought to be free of social constraints.

(b) Altruistic Suicide:

This is the second type of suicide given by Durkheim.
From the above discussion of egoistic suicide we come to
know that egoistic suicide is more likely to occur when
social integration is too weak. But in case of altruistic
suicide, social integration is too strong. More generally, the
persons committing altruistic suicide feel that it is their
duty to do so. Durkheim argued that in case of military,
altruistic suicide is most prominent because the degree of
integration is so strong that the individual will feel that he
has disgraced the entire group in its failure.

(c) Anomic Suicide:

The third major form of suicide given by Durkheim is
anomic suicide. This type of suicide is more likely to occur
when regulation is too weak. It is caused due to extreme
frustration of an individual. According to Durkheim, in
anomic suicide, societys influence is lacking basically in
the individual passions, thus leaving them without a check
therein. Anomic is a chronic state of affairs in the modern
socio-economic system. It occurs during industrial or
financial crises. He showed that there was a high rate of
anomic suicide among the wealthy as well as divorced
persons as most of them are not in a positive to adjust
themselves to violent changes in their life system and set
up.

(d) Fatalistic Suicide:

There is a little-mentioned fourth type of suicide-
fatalistic that Durkheim discussed only in a footnote in
Suicide as said by Bernard. It is more likely to occur when
regulation is excessive. Durkheim described that persons
more likely commit fatalistic suicide whose future is
pitilessly blocked and whose passions are violently
chocked. The classic example is the slave who takes his
own life because of too much regulation.

Durkheim demonstrated that all religions do not provide the

same degree of protection from suicide. His statistics showed that
 suicide rates go up for those who are unmarried and less integrated
into a family.

In his study of Suicide he tried to find out the reforms what could
be undertaken to prevent it. For him, attempts to convince the
individual directly not to commit suicide are futile, since its real causes

From the above table it is found that Durkheim tried to find out
the relation between the types of suicide and his two social currents.
These two social currents are integration and regulation. Integration
refers to the strength of the attachment that we have to society and
regulation refers of the degree of external constraint on people. When
integration is high, altruistic suicide takes place. But low integration
results in an increase in egoistic suicide. Anomic suicide is associated
with low regulation whereas fatalistic suicide with high regulation.

Durkheim demonstrated that all religions do not provide the

same degree of protection from suicide. His statistics showed that
suicide rates go up for those who are unmarried and less integrated
into a family.

In his study of Suicide he tried to find out the reforms what could
be undertaken to prevent it. For him, attempts to convince the
individual directly not to commit suicide are futile, since its real causes
are in society. It may be concluded that society and social currents are
mainly responsible for suicide.

Marvin Harris
Marvin Harris, (born August 18, 1927, New York, New York, U.S.
died October 25, 2001, Gainesville, Florida), American anthropological
historian and theoretician known for his work on cultural materialism.
His fieldwork in the Islas (Islands) de la Baha and other regions
of Brazil and in Mozambique focused on the concept of culture.
Harris saw functionalism in the social sciences as being similar to
adaptation in biology. His work on the surplus controversy and
ethno-energetic exchange in primitive cultures led him to
comparisons with medieval European economies, in which he
saw two distinct types, feudalism and manorialism. Many of his
theories challenged mainstream thought, including his belief that
cannibalism associated with Aztec religious rites was attributable
to protein deprivation and that neckties are worn to identify the
wearer as someone above physical labour. Among his best-
known works are The Rise of Anthropological
Theory (1968), Cannibals and Kings: The Origins of
Cultures (1977), Cultural Materialism: The Struggle for a Science
of Culture (1979), and Cultural Anthropology (1983).

Harris received a Ph.D. from Columbia University (1953),

where he taught anthropology from 1952. He also served as
technical adviser to the Brazilian Ministry of Education. His
theoretical work led to an active role in the anthropological
controversies of his day.

Harris' earliest work began in the Boasian tradition of

descriptive anthropological fieldwork, but his fieldwork
experiences in Mozambique in the late 1950s caused him to shift
his focus from ideological features of culture, toward behavioral
aspects. His 1969 history of anthropological thought, The Rise of
Anthropological Theory critically examined hundreds of years of
social thought with the intent of constructing a viable
understanding of human culture that Harris came to call Cultural
Materialism. The book, affectionately known as "The RAT" among
graduate students, is a remarkable synthesis of classical and
contemporary macrosocial theory.
Cultural materialism incorporated and refined Marx's
categories of superstructure and base; Harris modified and
amplified such core Marxist concepts as means of production and
exploitation, but Harris rejected two key aspects of Marxist
thought: the dialectic, which Harris attributed to an intellectual
vogue of Marxs time; and, unity of theory and practice, which
Harris regarded as an inappropriate and damaging stance for
social scientists. Harris also integrated Malthus' population
theory into his research strategy as a major determinant factor
in sociocultural evolution, which also contrasted with Marxs
rejection of population as a causal element.
According to Harris, the principal mechanisms by which a
society exploits its environment are contained in a society's
infrastructurethe mode of production (technology and work
patterns) and population (such as population characteristics,
fertility and mortality rates). Since such practices are essential
for the continuation of life itself, widespread social structures and
cultural values and beliefs must be consistent with these
practices. Since the aim of science, Harris writes, "is the
discovery of the maximum amount of order in its field of inquiry,
priority for theory building logically settles upon those sectors
under the greatest direct restraints from the givens of nature. To
endow the mental superstructure [ideas and ideologies] with
strategic priority, as the cultural idealists advocate, is a bad bet.
Nature is indifferent to whether God is a loving father or a
bloodthirsty cannibal. But nature is not indifferent to whether the
fallow period in a swidden [slash and burn] field is one year or
ten. We know that powerful restraints exist on the infrastructural
level; hence it is a good bet that these restraints are passed on
to the structural and superstructural components" (Harris 1979,
57).
Harris made a critical distinction between emic and etic,
which he refined considerably since its exposition in The Rise of
Anthropological Theory. The terms emic and etic originated
in the work of missionary-linguist Kenneth Pike,despite the
latters conceptual differences with Harris constructs. As used by
Marvin Harris, emic meant those descriptions and explanations
that are right and meaningful to an informant or subject,
whereas etic descriptions and explanations are those used by the
scientific community to germinate and force theories of
sociocultural life. That is, emic is the participant's perspective,
whereas etic is the observer's. Harris had asserted that both are
in fact necessary for an explanation of human thought and
behavior.
Marvin Harris early contributions to major theoretical
issues include his revision of biological surplus theory in obesity
formation. He also became well known for formulating a
materialist explanation for the treatment of Cattle in religion
in Indian culture. Along with Michael Harner, Harris is one of the
scholars most associated with the suggestion that Aztec
cannibalism occurred, and was the result of protein deficiency in
the Aztec diet. An explanation appears in Harris' book Cannibals
and Kings. Harris also invoked the human quest for animal
protein to explain Yanomamo warfare,
contradicting ethnographer Napoleon
Chagnons sociobiological explanation involving innate male
human aggressiveness.
Several other publications by Harris examine the cultural
and material roots of dietary traditions in many cultures,
including Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches: The Riddles of
Culture (1975); Good to Eat: Riddles of Food and Culture (1998 -
originally titled The Sacred Crow and the Abominable Pigs) and
his co-edited volume, Food and Evolution: Toward a Theory of
Human Food Habits (1987).
 Harris Why Nothing Works: The Anthropology of Daily
Life (1981 - Originally titled America Now: the Anthropology of a
Changing Culture) applies concepts from cultural materialism to
the explanation of such social developments in late twentieth
century United States as inflation, the entry of large numbers of
women into the paid labor force, marital stability, and shoddy
products.
His Our Kind: Who We Are, Where We're From, Where We
Are (1990) surveys the broad sweep of human physical and
cultural evolution, offering provocative explanations of such
subjects as human transsexualism and nontranssexualism and
the origins of inequality. Finally, Harris 1979 work, Cultural
Materialism: The Struggle, updated and re-released in 2001,
offers perhaps the most comprehensive statement of cultural
materialism. A separate article lists the many and
diverse publications of Marvin Harris.

Radcliff Brown

Concept of function
Radcliffe-Brown has often been associated
with functionalism, and is considered by some to be the founder
of structural functionalism. Nonetheless, Radcliffe-Brown
vehemently denied being a functionalist, and carefully
distinguished his concept of function from that of Malinowski,
who openly advocated functionalism. While Malinowski's
functionalism claimed that social practices could be directly
explained by their ability to satisfy basic biological needs,
Radcliffe-Brown rejected this as baseless. Instead, influenced by
the process philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead, he claimed
that the fundamental units of anthropology were processes of
human life and interaction. Because these are by definition
characterised by constant flux, what calls for explanation is the
occurrence of stability. Why, Radcliffe-Brown asked, would some
patterns of social practices repeat themselves and even seem to
become fixed? He reasoned that this would at least require that
other practices must not conflict with them too much; and that in
some cases, it may be that practices grow to support each other,
a notion he called 'coadaptation', deriving from the biological
term. Functional analysis, then, was just the attempt to explain
stability by discovering how practices fit together to sustain that
stability; the 'function' of a practice was just its role in sustaining
 the overall social structure, insofar as there was a stable social
structure (Radcliffe-Brown 1957). This is far from the 'functional
explanation' later impugned by Carl Hempel and others. It is also
clearly distinct from Malinowski's notion of function, a point
which is often ignored by Radcliffe-Brown's detractors.
"Malinowski has explained that he is the inventor of
functionalism, to which he gave its name. His definition of it is
clear; it is the theory or doctrine that every feature of culture of
any people past or present is to be explained by reference to
seven biological needs of individual human beings. I cannot
speak for the other writers to whom the label functionalist is
applied by the authors, though I very much doubt if Redfield or
Linton accept this doctrine. As for myself I reject it entirely,
regarding it as useless and worse. As a consistent opponent of
Malinowski's functionalism I may be called an anti-functionalist."

Concept of social structure

While Lvi-Strauss (1958) claimed that social structure and
the social relations that are its constituents are theoretical
constructions used to model social life, Radcliffe-Brown only half-
agreed
"to say we are studying social structures is not exactly the
same thing as saying that we study social relations, which is how
some sociologists define their subject. A particular social relation
between two persons (unless they be Adam and Eve in the
Garden of Eden) exists only as part of a wide network of social
relations, involving many other persons, and it is this network
which I regard as the object of our investigations.
"I am aware, of course, that the term "social structure" is
used in a number of different senses, some of them very vague.
This is unfortunately true of many other terms commonly used
by anthropologists. The choice of terms and their definitions is a
matter of scientific convenience, but one of the characteristics of
a science as soon as it has passed the first formative period is
the existence of technical terms which are used in the same
precise meaning by all the students of that science. By this test, I
regret to say, social anthropology reveals itself as not yet a
formed science.''"
In addition to identifying abstract relationships between
social structures, Radcliffe-Brown argued for the importance of
the notion of a 'total social structure', which is the sum total of
social relations in a given social unit of analysis during a given
period. The identification of 'functions' of social practices was
 supposed to be relative to this total social structure. Lvi-
Strauss saw social structure as a model.

Evolutionism, diffusionism, and the role of social anthropology

A major view in the study of tribal societies had been that all
societies follow a unilineal path ('evolutionism'), and that therefore
'primitive' societies could be understood as earlier stages along that
path; conversely, 'modern' societies contained vestiges of older forms.
Another view was that social practices tend to develop only once, and
that therefore commonalities and differences between societies could
be explained by a historical reconstruction of the interaction between
societies ('diffusionism'). According to both of these views, the proper
way to explain differences between tribal societies and modern ones
was historical reconstruction.
Radcliffe-Brown rejected both of these views because of the
untestable nature of historical reconstructions. Instead, he argued
for the use of the comparative method to find regularities in human
societies and thereby build up a genuinely scientific knowledge of
social life.
"For social anthropology the task is to formulate and validate
statements about the conditions of existence of social systems (laws of
social statics) and the regularities that are observable in social change
(laws of social dynamics). This can only be done by the systematic use
of the comparative method, and the only justification of that method is
the expectation that it will provide us with results of this kind, or, as
Boas stated it, will provide us with knowledge of the laws of social
development. It will be only in an integrated and organised study in
which historical studies and sociological studies are combined that we
shall be able to reach a real understanding of the development of
human society"[12]
To that end, Radcliffe-Brown argued for a 'natural science of
society'. He claimed that there was an independent role for
social anthropology here, separate from psychology, though not
in conflict with it. This was because psychology was to be the
study of individual mental processes, while social anthropology
was to study processes of interaction between people (social
relations). Thus he argued for a principled ontological distinction
between psychology and social anthropology, in the same way
as one might try to make a principled distinction between
physics and biology. Moreover, he claimed that existing social
scientific disciplines, with the possible exception of linguistics,
were arbitrary; once our knowledge of society is sufficient, he
argued, we will be able to form subdisciplines of anthropology
centred around relatively isolated parts of the social structure.
But without extensive scientific knowledge, it is impossible to
know where these boundaries should be drawn.